Court Opinion

ID: 9571359
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:31:05.151542+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:30:20.977685
License: Public Domain

Cooper, Judge,
dissenting.
The pivotal question in this case is whether the Supreme Court in Shessel v. Stroup, 253 Ga. 56 (316 SE2d 155) (1984) held that any difference in treatment between medical malpractice actions and other negligence actions with respect to when the limitation period begins to run was unconstitutional, or whether it simply held that a statute providing that the limitation period for medical malpractice begins to run at the time of the negligent act rather than the time of the injury was unconstitutional. In choosing the latter alternative, the majority has ignored the language as well as the rationale of Shessel. While the time period for bringing a negligence action under the general tort statute of limitation begins to run when the cause of action accrues, the time period for bringing a medical malpractice action under the statute challenged in Shessel began to run on the date the negligence occurred. “It is this difference in the beginning point for calculating the limitation period which is the focal point of this appeal.” (Emphasis supplied.) 253 Ga. at 57. Shessel was decided on equal protection grounds. Its purpose and effect, therefore, was not to establish a minimum level of protection for medical malpractice plaintiffs as the majority suggests, but to establish that there was no legitimate basis for different treatment. Indeed, in the process of comparing how the Shessel plaintiff’s case would be treated under the general tort statute of limitation with how it would be treated under that for medical malpractice actions and concluding that different treatment was impermissible, the Shessel Court noted the possibility that Georgia courts might apply the discovery rule if the case arose in a general tort context, implying that “[i]f Georgia has adopted the discovery rule,” application of the rule would be part of the treatment that must be the same. See id. Because I cannot accept the majority’s narrow interpretation of Shessel, I dissent.
*851Decided December 4, 1992 —
Reconsideration denied December 17, 1992.
Brimberry, Kaplan, Campbell & Donaldson, Jerry W. Brimberry, for appellants.
Whelchel, Whelchel & Carlton, James C. Whelchel, for appellees.