Medical Malpractice Standards (Loudoun Eye Care v. Bartin)

The Virginia Court of Appeals just came down with an opinion in Loudoun Eye Care v. Bartin that is incredibly important for medical malpractice claims. The case before the Court concerned a patient (Bartin) who received the services of Loudoun Eye Care ("LEC") for several treatments relating to his eyes.

After some treatment, the treating doctor referred Bartin to a specialist to treat Bartin's condition. After referral back, the LEC's doctors treated Bartin and - ultimately - Bartin was injured.

I'm jumping over numerous facts that are important, however, I want to get to the point: Bartin's claim was that the LEC's doctors were required to have referred him to a retinal expert and, because they did not, LEC's treatment fell below the standard of care of a doctor treating a patient in substantially similar circumstances.

The jury returned a $1.5M verdict for Bartin, and the doctors appealed. In the appellate Court, the doctors claimed that Bartin's case should fail because the evidence did not contain an expert witness to testify regarding the standard of care of the specialist - despite the sufficiency of the evidence that the defendant-doctors were negligent, and despite the evidence that the plaintiff was harmed, the Court of Appeals decided the patient should receive no compensation because evidence relating to someone else was absent.

The Court's reasoning was that without evidence of what the specialist should have done, the jury was unable to decide that the plaintiff was worse off because of the negligence of the defendant-doctor. I understand that position, however, as the trial court held, doesn't that just go to weight of the evidence of harm?

Perhaps the jury would have awarded the plaintiff $3M if there was more detailed evidence of how a specialist could have intervened, treated the retinal detachment, and otherwise ameliorated Bartin's condition. But clearly, the jury was able to see Bartin was in a worse condition because of the defendant-doctors' treatment - why isn't that enough?

I think this decision from the Court of Appeals is in error, and I believe the appeal to the Supreme Court of Virginia will be successful.

Medical malpractice cases are particularly challenging in Virginia, and there are layers upon layers of impediment against an injured plaintiff. This opinion by the Court of Appeals, if not overturned, will further serve to diminish the ability of injured patients to receive compensation for their injuries. Experts are extremely expensive - now, because of the Bartin opinion, at least one class of plaintiffs will need at least one additional expert witness taking the costs from astronomical to galactic.

When there is sufficient evidence to show the standard applicable to the defendant, breach of it, and sufficient evidence of harms related thereto, that should be enough - let the jury decide from there, and not legal technicalities.