Court Opinion

ID: 9781476
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 16:40:05.94232+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:11:06.812209
License: Public Domain

FEW, C.J.,
concurring.
I concur with the majority’s interpretation of the statutes at issue in this appeal. However, I believe our interpretation requires the conclusion that the statute of limitations has expired on any civil action Ranucci might have brought for malpractice. Therefore, the issues raised in this appeal are moot, and I would dismiss the appeal.
It is fundamental to our system of justice that a civil action must be commenced within the applicable statute of limitations. S.C.Code Ann. § 15-3-20(A) (2005) (“Civil actions may only be commenced within the periods prescribed in this title after the cause of action has accrued____”); Moates v. Bobb, 322 S.C. 172, 176, 470 S.E.2d 402, 404 (Ct.App.1996) (“Statutes of limitations are not simply technicalities. On the contrary, they have long been respected as fundamental to a well-ordered judicial system.”). A civil action is commenced by the filing and service of a summons and complaint. § 15-3-20(B); Rule 3(a)(1), SCRCP. The statute of limitations on a medical malpractice action is three years. S.C.Code Ann. § 15-3-545(A) (2005). Ranucci’s medical malpractice action accrued no later than June 10, 2006, and no civil action has ever been commenced.
*180Ranucci argues, however, that sections 15-36-100 and 15-79-125 of the South Carolina Code operate to toll the statute of limitations under the circumstances of this case. The majority has explained that Ranucci’s argument is invalid. To the majority’s analysis, I would add that section 15-36-100 does not ever toll the statute of limitations. The forty-five day extension in the section comes into play only after a summons and complaint have been filed and served. § 15-36-100(C)(1) (“In such a case, the plaintiff has forty-five days after the filing of the complaint to supplement the pleadings with the affidavit.” (emphasis added)). Therefore, it is never necessary under that section to toll the statute. Moreover, section 15-36-100(D) specifically provides “[tjhis section does not extend an applicable period of limitation.”
Section 15-79-125, on the other hand, does toll the statute of limitations. However, the maximum tolling period is explicitly stated in the section. Section 15-79-125(C) requires that “the parties shall participate in a mediation conference” “no later than one hundred twenty days from the service of the Notice” with the possibility that a circuit judge may extend the deadline sixty days for good cause. Section 15-79-125(E) then requires that an action for malpractice “must be filed: (1) within sixty days after” mediation. Thus, section 15-79-125 tolls the statute of limitations for a maximum of 240 days. Any further tolling must be prescribed by statute. § 15-3-20(A) (providing a civil action must be commenced within the statute of limitations “except when ... a different limitation is prescribed by statute”). There is no statute, nor any other provision of law, which tolls the statute of limitations beyond 240 days, even if the sufficiency of the Notice is being litigated before the circuit court, or during an appeal.
The law imposes upon a prospective plaintiff the duty of commencing a civil action within the applicable statute of limitations. Section 15-79-125 requires prelitigation mediation and other steps to be taken before a medical malpractice action may be commenced. To accommodate the additional requirements, the section allows the statute of limitations to be tolled for up to 240 days. When a medical malpractice defendant contends the additional steps required by section 15-79-125 have not been met, it may resist participating in the mediation. Anticipating the possibility that a prospective *181plaintiff may need a court order to force the mediation, the statute provides that “[t]he circuit court has jurisdiction to enforce the provisions of this section.” § 15-79-125(D).
These provisions give a prospective medical malpractice plaintiff the tools to complete the necessary steps to commence a medical malpractice lawsuit within the statute of limitations. There is no provision of law, however, which would allow a prospective plaintiff to commence any civil action five-and-a-half years after the statute of limitations began to run. Even if this court ruled in Ranucci’s favor, we could grant no more relief than to declare that the Notice was properly filed, and the circuit court erred in ruling to the contrary. We could never enable a summons and medical malpractice complaint to be filed and served before June 10, 2009.7 Sloan v. Friends of the Hunley, Inc., 369 S.C. 20, 26, 630 S.E.2d 474, 477 (2006) (“A moot case exists where a judgment rendered by the court will have no practical legal effect upon an existing controversy....”). The case is over, and the issues raised in this appeal are moot.

. Ranucci appears to have filed even the Notice after the expiration of the statute of limitations. According to that document, Ranucci began experiencing pain in her right breast. After an ultrasound, her gynecologist referred her to Dr. Crain for a biopsy, which was performed on June 7, 2006. According to Ranucci's Notice, "[s]ubsequent to the biopsy, the Plaintiff suffered severe pain with her respirations.” This "severe pain with her respirations” appears to have been of a different character and a different intensity from the previous "pain in her breast.” Thus, the statute of limitations would have begun to run as soon as she felt the different character of pain, not several days later when the cause of the pain was confirmed to be a collapsed lung. See Knox v. Greenville Hosp. Sys., 362 S.C. 566, 571-72, 608 S.E.2d 459, 462 (Ct.App.2005) (holding the statute on a medical malpractice action began to run upon the experience of pain the patient recognized to be different, not when the cause of the pain was subsequently diagnosed). It therefore appears that the statute of limitations expired even before the Notice was filed on June 8, 2009.