Court Opinion

ID: 9594890
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:33:45.748159+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:01:25.265856
License: Public Domain

Pope, Chief Judge,
concurring specially.
In Whitaker v. Zirkle, 188 Ga. App. 706 (374 SE2d 106) (1988), this court adopted the “discovery rule” in medical malpractice cases. Our Supreme Court denied certiorari in Whitaker, 188 Ga. App. 913, and that case has not been overruled; therefore, it must be followed by this court. The rationale underlying the discovery rule is that until symptoms of an injury or illness manifest themselves, it is impossible to know that a negligent act has occurred during medical treatment. To interpret OCGA § 9-3-71 (a) to hold that the statute of limitation begins running on the date of injury as the dissent advocates would work a manifest injustice in many medical malpractice cases in which no symptoms or other indications of the negligent act are manifested for several days or even several years so that the plaintiff is not aware of and, even assuming the exercise of reasonable care, cannot discover the injury on the day the negligent act occurred.
This court should also seize the opportunity presented by this case to adopt the doctrine of “continuous treatment” in medical malpractice cases. That doctrine provides: “ ‘(I)f the treatment by the doctor is a continuing course and the patient’s illness, injury or condition is of such a nature as to impose on the doctor a duty of continuous treatment and care, the statute does not commence running until treatment by the doctor for the particular disease or condition involved has terminated — unless during treatment the patient learns or should learn of negligence, in which case the statute runs from the time of discovery, actual or constructive.’ ” (Emphasis in original.) Taylor v. Phillips, 801 SW2d 303, 304 (Ark. 1990) (quoting 1 D. Louisell and H. Williams, Medical Malpractice, § 13.08 (1982)).1 There are several bases for the rationale underlying this doctrine: (1) a patient should properly place trust and confidence in his physician and should be excused from challenging the quality of care being rendered to him until that confidential relationship terminates, Otto v. Nat. Institute of Health, 815 F2d 985, 988 (4th Cir. 1987); (2) to require a patient to bring suit against his physician before treatment is terminated would conceivably afford the physician a defense that the patient left before treatment was terminated and before the physician *309had a chance to effectuate a proper result, Taylor v. Phillips, 801 SW2d 303, 305 (Ark. 1990); and (3) the treating physician is in the best position to identify and correct the malpractice, Cooper v. Kaplan, 585 NE2d 373, 374 (NY 1991).
Applying the doctrine of continuous treatment to the facts of this case, the plaintiff was clearly under a continuous course of treatment by the physician who performed the first abortion until the plaintiff decided to discontinue her treatment by that physician when she experienced pain and bleeding after the second abortion. This is illustrated by the fact that any products of conception remaining after the second procedure were ultimately a result of the incomplete performance of not only the second but also the first procedure. Because both abortions constituted a continuous treatment by the defendant physician and plaintiff did not discover the injury, that is, that a complete abortion had not been performed until March 20, 1989 when she experienced pain and bleeding after the second abortion, I would hold that the complaint filed on March 18, 1991 was timely filed to encompass all injuries resulting from both abortion procedures performed by the defendant physician.

 The doctrine of continuous treatment has been adopted by many other jurisdictions. See, e.g., Otto v. Nat. Institute of Health, 815 F2d 985 (4th Cir. 1987) (continuous treatment doctrine tolls statute of limitation in medical malpractice actions brought under the Federal Torts Claims Act in certain circumstances); Taylor v. Phillips, 801 SW2d 303 (Ark. 1990); Cooper v. Kaplan, 585 NE2d 373 (NY 1991); Vinklarek v. Cane, 691 SW2d 108 (Tex. Ct. App. 1985); Farley v. Goode, 252 SE2d 594 (Va. 1979); Samuelson v. Freeman, 454 P2d 406 (Wash. 1969); Metzger v. Kalke, 709 P2d 414 (Wyo. 1985).