Resident Who Assisted Supervising Physician But Who Exercised No Independent Medical Judgment Entitled to Summary Judgment

The Fourth Department determined defendant should have been granted summary judgment in a medical malpractice action. Defendant was a resident who assisted the supervising physician (Dr. Hall).  The court determined defendant had demonstrated he exercised no independent medical judgment during the treatment of the plaintiff (David Green):

It is well settled that a “resident who assists a doctor during a medical procedure, and who does not exercise any independent medical judgment, cannot be held liable for malpractice so long as the doctor’s directions did not so greatly deviate from normal practice that the resident should be held liable for failing to intervene” .. . Here, in support of his motion, defendant submitted evidence establishing that defendant Walter Hall, M.D., the supervising physician, conducted the initial meeting with plaintiff David Green, the patient. Defendant also submitted evidence establishing that Dr. Hall supervised defendant throughout all of the surgeries involved, reviewed all notes that defendant wrote, determined which surgical method would be used, decided to discontinue the first operation to obtain further information about the cyst or tumor that was to be excised, and decided to perform the subsequent operations. Furthermore, “[a]lthough the evidence demonstrated that [defendant] played an active role in [Dr. Hall’s] procedure, it did not demonstrate the exercise of independent medical judgment” by defendant … . Green v Hall, 2014 NY Slip Op 05084, 4th Dept 7-3-14