Richmond v. Hunt 
Opinion by Judge Combs; Judges Acree and Maze concurred. 

Appellant brought a medical malpractice action against his treating doctors and the medical practices where they worked, alleging that their failure to timely diagnose a blood clot deprived him of the opportunity to receive treatment that could have saved his hand from amputation. The circuit court granted summary judgment in favor of the doctors. Although the court acknowledged that genuine issues of material fact existed as to the doctors’ deviation from the standard of care, it nonetheless granted their motions for summary judgment based on causation alone – namely, that causation could not be established with certainty as a result of the testimony of appellant’s medical expert. The Court of Appeals vacated and remanded, holding that a genuine issue of material fact existed regarding whether the doctors’ failure to timely diagnose the blood clot caused appellant to eventually require amputation of his hand. The Court noted that there was “unquestioned deviation by the doctors from the proper standard of care” and concluded that the testimony and medical report from appellant’s expert demonstrated enough of a causal nexus between this deviation and appellant’s injuries to allow the case to survive summary judgment. In reaching this conclusion, the Court emphasized that while evidence of causation must be in terms of probability rather than mere possibility, substance should prevail over form and the total meaning – rather than a word-by-word construction – of the evidence should be the focus of the inquiry. Here, both appellant and appellees picked and chose language from the expert’s deposition utilizing “probability” and “possibility” almost interchangeably. The fact that emerged, however, was that the doctor opined that time was of the essence in saving appellant’s fingers. In light of this, summary judgment was inappropriate. 

Here are individual summaries prepared by the AOC organized by legal topics this months PUBLISHED decisions only.

For a list of all archived monthly summaries, please click here for those at the AOC web site and click here for those posted here on this blog.

Please note some of these published decisions may have pending motions for discretionary review OR rehearing so you are cautioned to confirm finality of disposition by going to the AOC’s web site.