Doctors Hosp. of Augusta, LLC v. Alicea – June 2015 (Summary)

ADVANCE DIRECTIVES

Doctors Hosp. of Augusta, LLC v. Alicea, No. A15A0107 (Ga. Ct. App. June 17, 2015)

The Georgia Court of Appeals ruled that the Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care Act did not provide immunity to a hospital and physician for their role in intubating a patient and placing her on a ventilator against her wishes. Accordingly, the court permitted claims against the hospital and physician for medical battery and other causes of action to continue. However, the court also ruled that the hospital and physician were entitled to summary judgment on claims that their actions constituted malpractice for lack of informed consent.

A woman serving as the administrator of the estate of her grandmother sued the hospital and a physician after her grandmother was intubated and placed on mechanical ventilation which prolonged her life. The patient, in her advance directive, had stated that she did not want her life to be prolonged when she had an incurable and irreversible condition that would result in her death within a relatively short time or when she became unconscious and to a reasonable degree of medical certainty would not regain consciousness. The patient also noted that her granddaughter was to make end-of-life decisions if she was unable to do so. The granddaughter told her grandmother’s physician that she wanted to be contacted before her grandmother was intubated for any reason. The doctor failed to contact his patient’s granddaughter after his patient suffered from complications from surgery that necessitated intubation. The patient was intubated and her granddaughter was forced to make the decision in conjunction with the attending physicians to remove the ventilator and enter a do not resuscitate order. The patient died soon after.

The granddaughter filed her complaint against the hospital and physician for damages from breach of agreement, professional and ordinary negligence, medical battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and breach of fiduciary duty for injuries arising out of the care of her grandmother. The doctor and hospital argued that they were immune from suit under the Advance Directive for Health Care Act. The court was not persuaded by this argument because in order to prove that they were entitled to immunity they had to establish that the uncontroverted evidence of record showed that they were making a good faith effort to rely on the directions and decisions of the health care agent when her grandmother was intubated in the intensive care unit. The court held that the defendants had not met this burden. However, the court dismissed the granddaughter’s informed consent claim, finding that the patient had not suffered an injury that was proximately caused by the lack of informed consent.