Court Opinion

ID: 9517725
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 00:29:53.652879+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:07:24.131247
License: Public Domain

OPINION ON PETITION FOR REHEARING
CONOVER, Presiding Justice.
Appellees Light and Funderburk have filed a petition for rehearing, claiming this court erred in its original opinion in several particulars. One issue they raise perhaps needs more exposition, namely, whether the Medical Review Panel provided by the Medical Malpractice Act has authority to determine whether a particular health care provider is “qualified” under the Act. Ap-pellees insist it does not because that Act provides
The. panel shall have the sole duty to express its expert opinion as to whether or not the evidence supports the conclusion that the defendant or defendants acted or failed to act within the appropriate standard of care as charged in the complaint. (Emphasis supplied).
IND. CODE 16-9.5-9-7. Appellees insist this limiting language prohibits such a panel from determining whether it has jurisdiction of the particular case under consideration. We disagree.
Statutes which vest authority to act in administrative agencies necessarily grant authority to that agency to determine whether it has jurisdiction to act in a given situation. Macauley v. Waterman S.S. Corporation (1946), 327 U.S. 540, 66 S.Ct. 712, 714, 90 L.Ed. 839; Anderson Lumber & Supply Co. v. Fletcher (1950), 228 Ind. 383, 89 N.E.2d 449, 452; 2 Am.Jur.2d, Administrative Law 332, Lawyers Co-op. Pub. Co. (1962).
The Medical Review Panel can act only if the health care provider before it is “qualified” under the Act. If so, the panel has statutory authority to proceed under the Act; if not, any further action of the panel *547in the given case is ultra vires and void. Anderson Lumber & Supply Co., supra. Clearly, the panel has the implied authority and duty to make that determination because it bears directly upon the question of whether the panel has jurisdiction to proceed further in the matter at hand. Thus, the Medical Review Panel here had authority to determine whether Light and Funder-burk were “qualified” health care providers as the sine qua non of its jurisdiction to proceed further.
The other issues raised by appellees in their petition were adequately covered in our original opinion. 531 N.E.2d 534.
Petition for rehearing denied.
MILLER, J., concurs.
GARRARD, P.J., concurs with separate opinion.