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By: Thomas Paschos & Associates, P.C.
Haddonfield, New Jersey

In Hurwitz v. AHS Hospital, 2014 N.J. Super. LEXIS 161 (Nov. 24, 2014), plaintiff, Dr. James Hurwitz filed a lawsuit against Overlook Hospital (legally known as AHS Hospital) after the hospital’s board of trustees stripped him of his surgical privileges. Hurwitz, who earned operating privileges at Overlook in 1998, came under review by the hospital in 2010 after shortcomings were revealed in the care that plaintiff had provided to certain patients. Over the next two years the investigation grew. In August 2010, his privileges were temporarily suspended pending the outcome of the investigation. After extensive administrative hearings conducted within the hospital, in which plaintiff and his attorney participated, the hospital's Board of Trustees revoked Hurwitz's clinical privileges. Hurwitz contended that the actions taken against him by the hospital were arbitrary, unreasonable, and unduly punitive. He sought relief in the trial court, based on several legal theories. Specifically, Hurwitz alleged breach of contract, breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing and violation of his due process rights.

The trial court dismissed the plaintiff's lawsuit. In doing so, the court relied upon immunities from monetary damages conferred by federal and New Jersey statutes upon hospitals and the participants in peer review processes when evaluating a physician's performance and in making decisions about that physician's clinical privileges. See 42 U.S.C.A. §§ 11111 to 11112 and N.J.S.A. 2A:84A-22.10. The court found that plaintiff had failed to present sufficient evidence or indicia to overcome those statutory immunities. The court further ruled that plaintiff had not justified the taking of depositions, or the pursuit of other additional discovery, before the immunity issues were adjudicated.

On appeal, the Superior Court affirmed the trial court's decision. Specifically, the Superior Court concurred that the hospital and the participants in the hospital's internal review processes were statutorily immune in this case from monetary liability. The court provided that “[t]his immunity from monetary liability has been enforced repeatedly by federal and state courts, aside from exceptional circumstances where the immunity has been overcome.” The court cited a 1994 ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, noting that it was not the proper role of the judiciary to substitute its judgment for that of a hospital’s governing board.

The Superior Court also agreed with the trial court that plaintiff had not identified sufficient grounds to establish that the hospital conducted its investigation without a reasonable basis for doing so, or that the hospital's revocation of plaintiff's privileges was imposed without a reasonable belief that such action was in furtherance of quality health care objectives. The court held that “[t]he record provides no evidence, nor even a plausible indication, that defendants failed to comport with…norms of fairness and reasonableness.”

Finally, the court sustained the trial court's ruling that plaintiff's allegations of wrongdoing by the hospital and the participants in the internal review process were insufficient to warrant depositions or the taking of other additional discovery. The court held that the right to obtain discovery, particularly depositions, in cases involving these immunity statutes is not absolute. Instead, the court may curtail discovery in its discretion “if there are no reasonable indicia that a factual basis to surmount the immunities will be uncovered.”

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