Baptist Mem’l Hosp.-N. Miss., Inc. v. Lambert (Summary)

EMPLOYMENT CONTRACT

Baptist Mem’l Hosp.-N. Miss., Inc. v. Lambert, No. 2013–CA–01002–COA (Miss. Ct. App. Jan. 27, 2015)

The Court of Appeals of Mississippi affirmed a lower court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of a physician against a hospital’s counterclaim for breach of contract. The dispute between the physician and the hospital arose when the hospital began to receive complaints from staff and patients about the physician’s angry and abusive behavior. Some of these complaints alleged that the physician had problems with his hands shaking and would sometimes become so insecure and hesitant that he would “freeze up” during surgery.

The CEO of the hospital requested that the physician attend an interview. During this interview, the physician agreed to enter the Mississippi Professional Health Program (“MPHP”), which eventually referred him for treatment at a recovery center. The recovery center evaluator recommended that the hospital place the physician in a monitoring contract with the MPHP for at least five years, and also warned that the physician was currently unfit to practice medicine with reasonable skill and safety.

The hospital suspended the physician’s clinical privileges once it received this evaluation. It then exercised an option to terminate his employment contract. The physician sued the hospital and the recovery center after he lost his job, but the claims were dismissed for failure to comply with the Mississippi Tort Claims Act.

Following this dismissal, the hospital brought its own lawsuit against the physician, claiming that he had failed to perform in accordance with the terms of his employment contract. The lower court granted summary judgment in favor of the physician, concluding that the physician’s obsessive-compulsive personality disorder made it impossible for him to perform in accordance with the contract.

On appeal, the hospital argued that the lower court had erroneously granted summary judgment. The Court of Appeals sided with the physician. It explained that even though the hospital was technically correct about the failure to plead the appropriate legal defenses, the practical impact of this was minimal – the physician could correct it simply by filing another motion in the lower court.

Two of the judges dissented from this ruling. In the dissenting opinion, they explained that the court had failed to distinguish the difference between a mental impairment and an actual disability resulting from a mental impairment. They argued that the mere existence of this mental disorder would not be enough to excuse the physician from his obligation to perform under the contract, and emphasized that the hospital’s claim should have been heard on the merits instead of dismissed through summary judgment.