Court Opinion

ID: 9607760
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 03:01:47.073083+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:39.952687
License: Public Domain

HUNTER, Judge,
concurring in the result.
I concur with the result of the majority’s opinion but would affirm the trial court’s entrance of a directed verdict on the ground that Violet R. Kerr’s (“plaintiff”) expert’s testimony was properly excluded, thereby making a directed verdict in favor of Dr. Fred L. Long, Jr. (“defendant”) appropriate.
The entry of a directed verdict is reviewed de novo. Herring v. Food Lion, LLC, 175 N.C. App. 22, 26, 623 S.E.2d 281, 284 (2005). As the majority correctly notes, upon a defendant’s motion for a directed *337verdict in a medical malpractice case, “ ‘the question raised is whether plaintiff has offered evidence of each of the following elements of his claim for relief: (1) the standard of care; (2) breach of the standard of care; (3) proximate causation; and (4) damages.’ ” Pope v. Cumberland Cty. Hosp. Sys., Inc., 171 N.C. App. 748, 750, 615 S.E.2d 715, 717 (2005) (citation omitted).
In this case, the trial court excluded the testimony of Dr. Mitchell M. Frost, plaintiff’s expert. Plaintiff argues that the exclusion of such testimony was in error, thereby rendering the trial court’s grant of directed verdict for defendant erroneous. I disagree.
In medical malpractice cases, to prevail, plaintiffs must establish by the greater weight of the evidence that the care of the defendant-healthcare provider “was not in accordance with the standards of practice among members of the same health care profession with similar training and experience situated in the same or similar communities at the time of the alleged act giving rise to the cause of action.” N.C. Gen. Stat. § 90-21.12 (2007). In opposing a motion for summary judgment or directed verdict, “a plaintiff must demonstrate that his expert witness is ‘competent to testify as an expert witness to establish the appropriate standard of care’ in the relevant community.” Purvis v. Moses H. Cone Mem’l Hosp. Serv. Corp., 175 N.C. App. 474, 477-78, 624 S.E.2d 380, 384 (2006) (quoting Billings v. Rosenstein, 174 N.C. App. 191, 196, 619 S.E.2d 922, 925 (2005)). Simply put, a plaintiff must produce expert testimony that: (1) the expert is familiar with the community where the injury occurred or a similar community; (2) the expert was familiar with the area or similar area on the date in which the injury occurred; and (3) the expert has similar training and experience as the defendant.
In this case, plaintiff’s expert testimony regarding his knowledge of Wake County, where the injury occurred, came from a website he visited in 2004. The date of the alleged injury was in 2003. Defendant therefore argues that the trial court did not err in excluding Dr. Frost’s testimony. I agree.
In Purvis, this Court held that an expert’s testimony was properly excluded where the expert’s only knowledge of the locality came four years after the alleged injury. Id. at 480-81, 624 S.E.2d at 385. We reasoned that “N.C. Gen. Stat. § 90-21.12 . . . specifically states that the expert must be familiar with the standard of care in the same or similar community ‘at the time of the alleged act giving rise to the cause of action.’ ” Id. at 480, 624 S.E.2d at 385 (emphasis added) (quoting *338N.C. Gen. Stat. § 90-21.12). Although plaintiff’s expert did not wait four years before gathering information on Wake County, he still failed to comply with the statute insofar as it requires knowledge at the time of the injury.3 Dr. Frost even testified that the time between the injury and his research on the standard of care in Wake County that he “would expect that there were some ... changes” in the standard. Cf. Roush v. Kennon, 188 N.C. App. 570, 576, -S.E.2d. -, - (No. COA07-209 filed 5 February 2008) (holding that an expert can comply with the timing requirement if an expert’s research, even after his or her deposition, revealed that the standard of care in his or her community was the same or similar to the standard of care in the community in which he or she is testifying when the injury occurred). I would therefore hold that plaintiff’s expert’s testimony was properly excluded per Purvis and thus plaintiff has failed to produce sufficient expert testimony to defeat defendant’s motion for a directed verdict, and I would affirm the ruling of the trial court on that ground.

. The fact that plaintiff’s expert relied on internet research is not a sufficient ground to exclude an expert’s testimony. See Coffman v. Roberson, 153 N.C. App. 618, 624-25, 571 S.E.2d 255, 259 (2002) (holding that experts may rely in part on internet research).