Court Opinion

ID: 9663310
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 23:35:03.052782+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:47.745382
License: Public Domain

McDonald, P.J.
(concurring in part and dissent*557ing in part). I do not believe there is a question of fact whether Dr. Jahan is an agent of the hospital or an independent contractor. Defendant’s status as a staff physician as well as plaintiff’s reliance on the hospital rather than a particular doctor to provide treatment renders defendant Jahan an agent of defendant hospital.
Grewe v Mount Clements General Hosp, 404 Mich 240; 273 NW2d 429 (1978), does not hold that physicians with staff privileges at a hospital are generally considered independent contractors but, rather, states that generally a physician who is an independent contractor and merely uses the hospital’s facilities to render treatment to his patients is not an agent of the hospital. As stated in Grewe, p 251:
[T]he critical question is whether the plaintiff, at the time of his admission to the hospital, was looking to the hospital for treatment of his physical ailments or merely viewed the hospital as the situs where his physician would treat him for his problems. [Emphasis added.]
The parties do not dispute that plaintiff relied on the hospital to render medical treatment and did not engage Dr. Jahan or any specific doctor’s services. Moreover, plaintiff’s amended complaints consistently allege defendant Jahan’s status to be that of agent to defendant hospital. I would affirm.