Court Opinion

ID: 9738004
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 19:40:10.354246+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:03.141389
License: Public Domain

TOBBINER, J.
I concur.
The opinion properly points out that the “jury could, and presumably did, find either that Dr. Wise was not negligent, or, if he was, that the negligence did not cause death,’’ and that we therefore could not hold the verdict unsupported by the evidence.
I believe it important, however, to emphasize that even though the jury may have found the attending physician’s conduct did not cause death, and even though we cannot hold the judgment unsupported by the evidence, the doctor did not meet his responsibilities in the matter. His failure is manifest in view of current conditions and the present developments of medical care.
As our opinion points out, the respondent doctor did not communicate with the Kaiser Hospital to notify it that he was sending a patient in need of prompt treatment by a neurosurgeon. The patient was to be transported for a distance of 17 miles to this second hospital. The patient would arrive at a late hour of night. A phone call to the Kaiser Hospital was *206at the least a matter of common courtesy and conceivably a matter of life and death. The doctor did not notify, and, far less, cooperate with the Kaiser Hospital in the matter of the care of this severely injured patient.
Such failure of cooperation is particularly dangerous to the multitude of present-day victims of motor vehicle accidents. In an age of industrialism and congestion, when death and accident from motor vehicles exact a mounting toll on our streets and highways, we are peculiarly dependent upon prompt medical care. It is fitting that the medical profession is manifesting its awareness of the enormity of the problem of emergency treatment and is taking steps to meet it. As pointed out by Ernest C. Shortliffe, M.D., “Emergency Rooms,” (Hospitals, Journal of the American Hospital Association (February, 1960), vol. 34, p. 32) : “Accidents now constitute the fourth cause for death in the United States and are the leading cause of death among all persons between the ages of one year and 36 years. Quite apart from this fact, however, there is a practical reason for a review of our own emergency rooms. Surveys have established that from 1940 to 1955 the emergency room load in hospitals increased by approximately 400 per cent. The administrative implications of this become apparent when we realize that 63 per cent of these hospitals report they have undertaken emergency room changes within the past two years and that a further 22 per cent of the hospitals are contemplating changes. Obviously then, the administrators of the hospitals and their medical and surgical staffs are becoming aware of difficulties in managing the emergency room patient load.”
In this complex, integrated society, a hospital and its staff no longer exist in isolation. Hospitals, like many other functionaries in the society, can no longer be regarded as private ventures but must be treated as public institutions fulfilling social responsibilities. In meeting those responsibilities the hospitals themselves have recognized the necessity for cooperation among all hospitals in a community. The Code of Ethics of the American College of Hospital Administrators and American Hospital Association states as one of its objectives: “The hospital, therefore, should cooperate with recognized hospital associations and agencies interested in strengthening the facilities of hospitals and should assume leadership in developing cooperative action with other hospitals within the community or region to assure adequate service for all persons in need of hospital care.” (P. 3.) Such cooperative action becomes particularly important in emergency care.
*207I thoroughly understand that the responsibility placed upon the hospital and its staff by the kind of problem presented here cannot be fulfilled with ease. Fortunately the medical profession is facing, and attempting to fulfill, its obligation. Unfortunately it is all too clear that the minimal requirements of that responsibility were flagrantly disregarded in this ease. While we cannot hold that the death in transit was caused by the doctor’s lack of cooperation with the second hospital, and while we therefore must affirm the judgment, I cannot condone the respondent doctor’s performance.
A petition for a rehearing was denied January 5, 1961, and appellants’ petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied January 31, 1961.