David Prewitt v. Semmes-Murphey Clinic, P.C., et al.

The plaintiff was rendered a quadriplegic after a car accident, and he received care at The Regional Medical Center at Memphis. The hospital staff included University of Tennessee School of Medicine residents, private physicians who were dual employees of a private corporation and the University of Tennessee as part of its residency training program, and nurses employed by another private corporation. The dual employee physicians treated patients independently in their capacity as employees of the private corporation and supervised resident physicians in their capacity as
employees of the University of Tennessee. A University of Tennessee resident physician intended to perform a lumbar puncture procedure on the plaintiff, and he left a written request for a nurse for a lumbar puncture kit for said procedure. The nurse provided this kit, but did not include an antiseptic. The day of the procedure, the resident physician lowered the plaintiff’s bed rail and placed the plaintiff on his side in anticipation of performing the lumbar puncture, but when he noticed that an antiseptic was missing from the kit, he briefly left the plaintiff unattended to obtain the antiseptic. When the resident physician returned to the room, the plaintiff had fallen off the bed onto the floor. The plaintiff ruptured his spleen from the fall, requiring major surgery which resulted in subsequent complications. The plaintiff filed suit in both the Tennessee Claims Commission and the circuit court against the resident, the University, the hospital, the nurse, and the present corporate defendants, alleging claims of medical malpractice and negligent supervision. The liability of the resident and the University was stipulated by the parties in the Claims Commission, and these parties were dismissed from the circuit court proceeding on the basis of immunity. The present defendant corporations remained in the circuit court action. After discovery, the plaintiff moved for summary judgment in the circuit court. The defendant physicians’ corporation moved for summary judgment based upon immunity and the plaintiff’s lack of expert testimony, and the defendant nurse’s corporation moved for summary judgment based upon the plaintiff’s lack of expert testimony.  The trial court granted both defendants’ motions for summary judgment and certified the judgments as final. The plaintiff filed a timely notice of appeal to this Court.  We affirm.