Determining Duty of Care and the Physician-Patient Relationship: Fall 2024

McCurry v. Singh (2024 WL 4141976) is a recent decision in which the Court of Appeal affirmed summary judgment in favor of the defendant doctor (Dr. Singh) on the ground there was no physician-patient relationship between the doctor and the deceased patient. The patient was brought to the emergency department at Methodist Hospital where the emergency physician concluded she was likely having a myocardial infarction and needed a cardiac catheterization, a procedure Methodist Hospital was not equipped to perform. He therefore contacted Dr. Singh, an on-call interventional cardiologist at Mercy General Hospital. Dr. Singh initially agreed the patient needed acute catheterization, but upon learning of decedent’s elevated creatinine and other conditions, he concluded she would not be a candidate for the procedure. As a result, he never agreed to have the decedent transferred to Mercy General Hospital and never undertook to treat her. Under those circumstances the court concluded no physician-patient relationship was established and Dr. Singh therefore owed no duty of care to the decedent.

-B. Thomas French

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