Court Opinion

ID: 9854612
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:09:59.028005+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:23:10.521400
License: Public Domain

Finley, C. J.
(dissenting)—I dissent. I would hold that plaintiffs in both cases waived their physician-patient privilege upon filing of their complaints.
My reasons for this position were set forth in my dissent in Bond v. Independent Order of Foresters, 69 Wn.2d 879, 883, 421 P.2d 351, 354 (1966). Summarized briefly, they are as follows: (1) The question presented is not whether the *451physician-patient privilege is desirable or should be maintained, but rather under what circumstances is the privilege waived. (2) This question is judicial, not legislative. (3) The policy underlying our rules of procedure, although allowing for privileged communications, seeks to promote accessibility to relevant information. (4) Our decisions (prior to Bond) seem to support the view that the act of filing a complaint waives the physician-patient privilege in personal injury cases insofar as information about injuries subject to litigation is concerned. (5) To be consonant with the policy underlying our rules of procedure, the physician-patient privilege should be deemed waived at the earliest appropriate time; this would seem to be, as suggested by our prior decisions, the time when a complaint is filed.
The majority opinion in the instant case is, in my view, an improvement over the majority opinion in Bond, supra. Many, if not all, plaintiffs in personal injury cases eventually waive their physician-patient privilege as to relevant injuries. By apparently endorsing the federal decisional rule10 of accelerated waiver, the majority in the instant case has recognized this fact and has encouraged employment of discovery procedures once it is clear that waiver of the physician-patient privilege will ultimately occur.
In my judgment, however, the accelerated-waiver rule is less desirable than a rule imposing waiver at some specific point in time. The accelerated-waiver rule, unlike a specific point waiver rule, will require a type of case-by-case decision-making at the trial court level which will promote appellate litigation. Parties to personal injury actions may not easily ascertain when waiver has in fact occurred. They may be unsure of how to proceed with litigation if they wish to avoid waiver. The accelerated-waiver rule, again unlike a specific point waiver rule, fails to fulfill one of the principal functions of any decisional rule—settlement of *452particular issues so that the results of future controversies can be better predicted. In short, the accelerated-waiver rule, in contrast to a specific point-waiver rule, may create as many difficulties as it resolves.
As stated in the dissent in Bond, a rule imposing waiver at a particular point in time—specifically, upon filing of a complaint—is “consistent with protecting the justifiable interests of the plaintiff, with the progressive policy of our rules of procedure, and with our traditional concept of litigation as a truth-finding process.” 69 Wn.2d at 886, 421 P.2d at 356. In my judgment, such a rule should be adopted by this court. Accordingly, I would affirm the order entered in the Appolito case and reverse the order entered in the Ashurst case.
McGovern, J., concurs with Finley, C. J.

Greene v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 40 F.R.D. 14 (N.D. Ohio 1966); Awtry v. United States, 27 F.R.D. 399 (S.D.N.Y. 1961); Mariner v. Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co., 202 F. Supp. 430 (N.D. Ohio 1962).