Court Opinion

ID: 9862183
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 01:03:05.962048+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:30:30.585957
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE APPLETON, specially concurring: I concur with the result reached by the majority but write separately to state my belief that the provisions of the Act have no application to this situation. Plaintiff had been a patient of the Christie Clinic department of internal medicine. Plaintiff did not attend the physical facility of the clinic as a destination but rather to be treated by medical personnel. For whatever reason, clinic personnel decided to terminate their professional relationship with plaintiff and had the right to do so. See Olaf v. Christie Clinic Ass’n, 200 Ill. App. 3d 191, 195, 558 N.E.2d 610, 613-14 (1990) (the right to engage in a physician-patient relationship is not absolute but is instead terminable at will). I am aware of no law that requires a regulated professional— doctor, lawyer, dentist, accountant — to treat or serve every applicant, in fact, the service at issue here is recognized by the law above to be discretionary with the provider (after taking all abandonment and malpractice issues into consideration). Christie Clinic, as a place, may be forced to be open to all persons regardless of disability, but the medical personnel who work within the clinic’s walls cannot be made to treat patients against their will.