FRANKFORT, Ky. (Legal Newsline) - A man who told an emergency room doctor he didn’t use drugs, refused further treatment and then suffered a heart infection caused by injecting drugs had no case, a Kentucky appeals court ruled, agreeing a trial court properly dismissed the lawsuit.
Bennie Junior Stanley was asleep in his car with a handgun on his lap when police knocked on the window, responding to a 911 call about a suspicious car. The police found marijuana in the car and discovered he also had a restraining order prohibiting him from carrying a firearm.
Stanley complained of chest pain from a workplace injury to his ribs, so the police called emergency medical services to evaluate him. Stanley refused an offer from EMS to go to the hospital, so the police took him to the University of Kentucky Emergency Department.
Once there, Stanley refused to sign a consent agreement for treatment. He was moved to a room where Dr. Sameer Madhu Desai evaluated him as required under a federal law mandating medical screening for uninsured patients in emergency departments.
Stanley told the doctor again he didn’t want to be treated and said his only medical condition involved injuries from a workplace accident earlier that day. He denied using tobacco, alcohol or recreational drugs.
The doctor completed a 14-point examination, found no abnormalities and released Stanley to police custody. While there, he suffered a hypoxic condition due to his heart infection. His guardians then sued Dr. Desai, claiming he violated the standard of care by failing to detect the heart infection. Other defendants settled, but Dr. Desai refused. A trial court dismissed the case, saying he had no duty beyond the requirement under federal law to perform an emergency examination.
The Kentucky Court of Appeals agreed, in a Feb. 4 decision that drew one dissent. Stanley made it clear he didn’t want to be treated and that meant there was no physician/patient relationship beyond the emergency requirements under federal law, the appeals court ruled in a decision by Judge Glenn Acree.
“Stanley did not want to be in the emergency room, he did not consent to treatment and expressly refused it, and he manifested his refusal to form the necessary relationship by providing dishonest answers regarding his history of drug use,” the court concluded. “In sum, he refused to be a part of any physician/patient relationship.”
Judge Allison Jones dissented, saying that while it was “admittedly a close case,” a jury should have decided whether Dr. Desai breached a duty of care to the plaintiff. Stanley was billed for the care, she said, and “many patients do not fully and honestly answer all the treating physician’s questions.”
“Dr. Desai argues that he performed a full fourteen-point screening and Stanley would not have allowed any more treatment,” she wrote. “However, the question in this case, I believe, is whether Dr. Desai should have advised Stanley that additional treatment was necessary for him to properly assess whether an emergency situation existed.”