Court Opinion

ID: 9669676
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 03:05:52.195494+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:15:59.660445
License: Public Domain

Archer, J.
(dissenting in Guertin only). I disagree with the majority’s "presumption” analysis, and find the Court of Appeals holding in Moore v Fragatos, 116 Mich App 179; 321 NW2d 781 (1982) (which places the burden on the defendant to prove by clear and convincing evidence that the patient knowingly, intelligently, and voluntarily waived rights to court access and to revoke the agreement within sixty days), to represent the sounder approach.
As noted in Moore, supra, access to the court system is a fundamental right. Id. at 185. The Medical Malpractice Arbitration Act, MCL 600.5040 et seq.; MSA 27A.5040 et seq., entails the waiver of that fundamental right. In the area of civil law, courts must indulge every reasonable presumption against the waiver of a fundamental right, Aetna Ins Co v Kennedy, 301 US 389, 393; 57 S Ct 809; 81 L Ed 1177 (1937), and there can be no presumption that a party acquiesces to the loss *194of a fundamental right. Ohio Bell Telephone Co v Ohio Public Utilities Comm, 301 US 292, 307; 57 S Ct 724; 81 L Ed 1093 (1937). Accordingly, the burden of proving the waiver of the right to court access is on the party asserting the waiver.
MCL 600.5041(7); MSA 27A.5041(7) and MCL 600.5042(8); MSA 27A.5042(8) state that an "agreement to arbitrate which includes the provisions of this section shall be presumed valid.” This language does not provide a presumption that the waiver contained therein is knowing and voluntary. The majority has, in essence, construed the "presumption” to be rebuttable. Thus, once the defendant has offered evidence to establish that the arbitration agreement itself complies with the provisions of the arbitration act, it has made out a prima facie case. The presumption then casts the burden of proof to the plaintiff. However, when classifying the presumption as rebuttable, once the plaintiff puts at issue his contention that the alleged waiver of his constitutional rights was unknowing, involuntary, or unintelligent, the presumption would disappear, and the burden of proof would remain with the defendants to affirmatively show the contrary. See Krisher v Duff, 331 Mich 699, 705; 50 NW2d 332 (1951); Klat v Chrysler Corp, 285 Mich 241, 247; 280 NW 747 (1938).
The question then becomes what quantum of evidence is necessary for defendants to sustain their burden. For the defendants to rely on rote testimony of habit and custom is clearly not enough. The true beneficiary of the mmaa is the health care provider. However, with the benefit should come the burden of producing clear, positive, and credible evidence that the statutory "safeguards to ensure the fairness of the arbitration process” have been strictly followed.
It is health care providers who should be the *195most motivated to conform to the requirements of the act, because they benefit from it. It is health care providers who have the personnel who can be trained in very simple, non-time-consuming procedures in order to record and keep relevant evidence. The burden should be placed on the party which can best meet it. That party, in all cases involving health care providers and patients, would be the health care provider. It is a small burden, in exchange for all the benefits they acquire from the agreement, to be obligated to simply and inexpensively memorialize the fact of each individual patient’s knowing, intelligent, and voluntary waiver.
There are numerous ways a hospital or physician can provide more than rote habit or custom evidence to support their burden of showing a knowing, intelligent, and involuntary waiver within the execution of an arbitration agreement.1 For example, a slight modification of the arbitration form to allow a space for the patients to initial the following seems to be the least burdensome: (1) that the patient has been given a booklet detailing the specific provisions of the arbitration agreement at the time of affixing the initials, (2) that the patient was given a copy of the agreement at the time of affixing the initials, (3) that the offer to arbitrate did not precede emergency medical care, and (4) that the patient has been informed that the offer, if accepted, can be revoked within sixty days if revoked in writing.
Under the majority’s holding, all that is needed *196to obtain the benefit of the statutory presumption of validity is the patient’s signature and an employee trained to produce testimony indicative of habit and custom, irrespective of whether the "usual” procedure was followed in the patient’s particular case. This is insufficient. If the words of the trial judge in the instant case are used as an indicator, trial judges agree that testimony of custom and habit or standard procedures are insufficient methods of proving compliance with the act to meet an initial burden or to rebut the evidence presented by the plaintiff. During the admitting clerk’s testimony in this case, wherein she testified on the basis of her usual procedure, the trial court stated:
I am more interested [in] what she did, if she can remember what [sic] this patient, not what she ordinarily does. This is what I have got to decide on.
While hospital employees simply say that they always offer the arbitration agreement in a manner consistent with the statute, the patient has the impossible burden of proving the arbitration agreement was not properly offered to him. Placing the burden on the plaintiff to show the invalidity of the agreement forces the plaintiff to prove a nullity, which is one of the most difficult things to do in the field of evidence. Yet, at a time, usually during admission to the hospital, when the plaintiff is likely to be apprehensive, scared, in pain, and least likely to absorb the importance of the documents he may be signing, the majority would have the plaintiff be responsible for gathering evidence to show that the statutory requirements were not complied with.
I am also concerned about the testimony of the *197hospital employee (the admitting clerk) in this case. Ante, pp 186-187. A review of the hospital employee’s explanation of the arbitration information that she routinely gave to patients should have enlightened the majority as to how "routinely” patients have the potential to be misled or misinformed. Relying upon the clerk’s testimony does not, in my mind, meet the burden of proof.
Perhaps safeguards could be adopted that would effectuate the policy of the Legislature. The patient should know what is being signed and what the result of that signature will mean. If accomplished, the result would facilitate proofs and diminish the likelihood of evidentiary hearings, which would save time for the court and the parties. The majority does not provide safeguards.
I therefore dissent from the majority’s failure to place the burden of proof of clear, positive, and credible evidence on the health care provider and hospital.

 Suggestions made to the court include: (1) providing the patient with an audio tape to listen to, along with the agreement and booklet; (2) taped vocal acceptance on the part of the patient; (3) having an employee whose job is to explain the agreement to the patient and to have that employee personally witness the signature of the patient, and (4) providing the patient with the agreement and booklet before he comes to the hospital for admittance.