Case Lecture on Mohr v Williams PDF

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Case Notes on Mohr v Williams...

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Med/Mal Law Case Lecture on Mohr v Williams Mohr v. Williams This is a case about battery and consent in the context of a physician administering treatment Do the parties in agreement that a surgeon who operates without patient consent commits a battery? Questions the court considers: 1. Did patient imply consent? Defendants position: yes Plaintiffs position: no Courts position: no In order to obtain implied consent if Patient furnishes implied consent to a procedure if o Rule: patient gives implied consent when she is unconscious or otherwise unable to give express consent and danger of life or limb o It leaves us with this question is their relevance with the fact that the surgeon operated what is identified as different body part then that which he had express consent, in other words; would this case have come out differently if instead of operating on the left ear the surgeon had discovered and unforeseen condiiton on the right ear to cover the 2nd condition, would that have mattered? (We don’t know the answer to this) o Ear A- she consented o Ear B- she had an examination o Court said it wasn’t an emergency she could have waited to have the surgery done o In this case, the emergency was not serious enough 2. If the patient didn’t furnish implied consent she did furnish express consent(according to defendant)through an agent her family physician who was present at the operation who issued consent o Defendants position: on the evidence presented jury would have to conclude that- evidence was clear that plaintiff gave implied consent & court says no there was room for doubt o Plaintiff says NO the jury is free to go either way & the court says NO 3. Was the physician authorized to consent? There was enough evidence for the jury to decide that physician was not there to authorize 4. There was no evil intent- no intent to do harm therefore the jury could not find a battery and the judge should have known better and shouldn’t have let the jury decide and say that you don’t have evidence of battery here—defendants position

and definition of battery is--- one commits a battery if he intentionally inflicts harm upon another >>there was no evidence that defendant o TRUE OR FALSE: is this court takin the position that whether a defendant does or does not in his own mind intend harm is irrelevant to the question of battery –Yes. This court is saying that when we are speaking of battery, one thing that does not matter is what he intended o The consent of plaintiff for the operation was necessary- defendant says in this case consent was not necessary because it was an emergency, defendants position: consent is necessary & in this case there is implied consent, defendants position is express consent is not necessary o

RULE THAT EMERGES FROM THIS CASE:

o Case about Battery, surgery, and consent o On those issues what do the parties go into agreeing? o They agree that sometimes a touching committed without consent= BATTERY o The questions: (a) is a malicious intent essential to a battery? PL’s position: NO & DeFs Position: Yes, Courts position: NO o Question (b): in this case is the evidence sufficient to allow the jury to find that the patient did not furnish implied consent? PLS answer: YES there was sufficient evidence and Defs Answer: No there was not sufficient evidence to find that the patient did not furish implied consent, Courts Answer: YES there was. b/c evidence of implied consent is evidence that o There is enough evidence to allow thejury to conclude that there was no emergency o Question (c) is there sufficient evidence to find that the patient did not furnish express consent? PL=YES, DF position=NO because the evidence is clear that the family physician was acting as her authorized agent with authority to consider and that he did so, no reasonable juror would find that this physician was not authorized to give consent, he was on this evidence because he didn’t protest—COURTS CONCLUSION: yes there was sufficient evidence that the family physician was not authorized to act as the PLs agent in giving consent

o If in this case there has been a verdict for the defendant and the PL and the plaintiff asked for a JNOV & the judge granted that---& PL appealed that---if in this case the jury had returned a verdict for the surgeon-no liability---and the PL, patient, had moved for JNOV and the court granted that judgment for PL as a matter of law—would this court have said that was error on the trial courts part or not?— o Two steps of law that this court seems to articulate anew; implied consent-a patient furnishes implied consent to a medical procedure if she is unconscious or otherwise unable to give express consent & if the situation at hand constitutes such an emergency as to warrant the physician in concluding that the patient would consent were she able (professor thinks the court is reaching for that) & the other thing learned anew: in order to commit a battery, one need not intend any harm to the person he touches without consent & that means in respect to medicine and surgery, any touching not consented to, no matter how magnificent the intent IS A BATTERY o NO DEFINITION OF CONSENT, DOESN’T TELL US THAT CONSENT MEANS, ASKS A QUESTION THEN WE LOOK TO ANSWER THE PARTS.. BUT WHAT IS CONSENT? THERE IS NO JURY INSTRUCTION ON WHAT IS CONSENT! o A patient consents to a proposed treatment if by her words written or spoken or her behavior she leads a reasonable person in a providers position to believe that she has assented to delivery of a proposed treatment. o P.19- 2nd paragraph—SEE THAT!! Mohr v. Williams--o Verdict for plaintiff o After the jury returned a verdict for plaintiff, defendant moved for a judgment notwithstanding the verdict which amounts to a statement o This means it was defendants position that the evidence was insufficient to allow the jury to conclude that defendant was liable, more specifically defendant contended that the evidence is clear and uncontridicted to the effect that plaintiff impliedly consented to the surgery and that if she didn’t that she expressly consented to the surgery, to an agent and if that is not so that there is no evidence of battery because there is no evidence that the defendant intended any harm o To get a JNOV-Judge Must come to conclusion that there wasn’t enough evidence to support the winning parties contentions

o P.16-If it became fatal---then it would warrant the conclusion that she impliedly consented o This is a question for the jury—whether she gave implied consent o There was enough evidence ot justify the jury in concluding that she did not give implied consent, were not saying that we’re holding it as a matter of law but there was enough evidence that allowed the jury to conclude there was no implied consent and the evidence that the court points to is o The real decision by court is there is enough evidence to take this question from the jury or in other words there is sufficient jury to let the jury to decide what it did o What would be such evidence that would not allow the jury to say there was no emergency? o >evidence that she’d suffer serious damage (which was not found) o In order to find implied consent a jury would have to conclude that the patient was unconscious or other incompetent...