Court Opinion

ID: 9574549
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:05:51.140107+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:44:43.925347
License: Public Domain

BLACKBURN, Judge,
concurring specially.
While I agree fully with the analysis and result of the majority opinion, I take this opportunity to point out my concern over the fact that the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur is not applicable to medical malpractice actions in Georgia.
In Shea v. Phillips, 213 Ga. 269, 271 (2) (98 SE2d 552) (1957), our Supreme Court stated: “In an action brought by a patient against his physician or surgeon for malpractice, the presumption is that the medical or surgical services were performed in an ordinarily [skillful] manner, and the burden is on the one receiving the services to show a want of due care, skill, and diligence. And in such a case, the proof ordinarily required to overcome such a presumption of care, skill, and diligence is that given by physicians or surgeons as expert witnesses.” The doctrine of res ipsa loquitur is as appropriate in medical malpractice cases as it is in any other tort action where the required factors are involved. Georgia courts, however, have determined that “[r]es ipsa loquitur is not applicable in medical malpractice cases in Georgia.” Kapsch v. Stowers, 209 Ga. App. 767 (1) (434 SE2d 539) (1993). This simply goes too far.
While Georgia has chosen to limit the application of res ipsa loquitur, “[i]n recent years the scope of the . . . doctrine in malpractice actions has been measurably enlarged [in other states]. The courts have not only found sufficient facts to fulfill the special requirements of the doctrine, but also have manifested an acute awareness of the need to protect an injured patient by requiring the physician to explain the reason for the injury, or suffer the penalty of an adverse inference in the absence of an explanation.” 61 AmJur2d 492, Physicians, Surgeons, Etc., § 333. As Dean Prosser has pointed out, “where the particular defendant is in a position of some special *259responsibility toward the plaintiff or the public [res ipsa loquitur] is designed to protect the dependent party from unexplained injury at the hands of one in whom he has reposed trust. In an integrated society where individuals become inevitably dependent upon others for the exercise of due care, where these relationships are closely interwoven with our daily living, the requirement for explanation is not too great a burden to impose upon those who wield the instruments of injury and whose due care is vital to life itself.” (Punctuation omitted.) Klein v. Arnold, 203 NYS2d 797, 800 (2) (citing Prosser, Res Ipsa Loquitur in California, 37 Cal. L. Rev. 183, 224) (1949). I agree with this learned analysis, and, accordingly, I believe that Georgia has improperly immunized medical professionals from assuming the burden of explaining their actions in appropriate cases where res ipsa loquitur would normally apply. The cost of this gratuitous benefit to the medical profession is being paid by the victims of medical malpractice, who are uniquely penalized, unlike any other category of victims of tortious conduct.
Decided March 17, 1998.
Greer, Klosik & Daugherty, Frank J. Klosik, Jr., John F. Daugherty, Robert J. McCune, for appellants.
Tisinger, Tisinger, Vance & Greer, David H. Tisinger, Webb, Car-lock, Copeland, Sender & Stair, Wade K. Copeland, Patricia M. Anagnostakis, Cameron P. Turner, Long, Weinberg, Ansley & Wheeler, Sidney F. Wheeler, Ashley A. Parker, for appellees.
I would hope that the legislature will correct this inequity, and treat victims of medical malpractice the same as other tort victims.