Court Opinion

ID: 9566206
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:35:00.432063+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:32:03.093654
License: Public Domain

ALMA WILSON, Justice,
concurring specially:
I concur specially to emphasize the significance of Part IV. Under Part IV, a personal representative in probate has a duty to mail “notice to creditors” to the hospital whenever the deceased received hospital care related to the last illness. Part IV recognizes no exception to this duty. Notice must be mailed to the hospital, even though the hospital advises that the charges will be paid by the insurer or the hospital is advised of the pending probate. Mailing of the “notice to creditors” to all identifiable health care providers for the last illness of the deceased, without regard to insurance coverage, will place the burden upon the health care provider to timely preserve its claim, whether liquidated or unliquidated. Close attention to this duty by the bar will eliminate intolerable lapses of time from the notice to the filing of claims by health care providers caused by delays in processing insurance claims. With notice mailed, the hospital will not be in a position to seek payment *649through the probate court more than four years after publication of the notice to creditors, as in the instant case. With notice mailed, operation of the non-claim statute, 58 O.S.Supp.1990, § 331.2, will bar both the filing and the arising of the claim of the health care provider or its assignee.