Verdicts

The defendant chiropractor moved for dismissal, asserting that the misdiagnosis, if any, took place more than two and a half years prior to the filing of the suit, so that the lawsuit was untimely under New York's Civil Practice Law and Rules (CPLR) ' 214-a. That statute says that any lawsuit for medical, dental or podiatric malpractice must be filed within two and a half years of the alleged negligence. The trial court dismissed the suit.

The appeals court reversed. It pointed to a 1986 case that addressed the nature of chiropractic services; it said that the issue “as to whether [the defendant chiropractor's] services constituted medical treatment” was a question of fact for the jury (Foote v Picinich, 118 AD2d 156, 157 (3d Dept 1986)). That question turns on whether the treatment is incident to medical care. Here, the appeals court found that the plaintiff's chiropractic treatment was not medical treatment because it “was not an integral part of the process of rendering medical treatment to a patient or substantially related to any medical treatment provided by a physician.” Thus, claims related to this care were not subject to the shortened limitations period of CPLR ' 214-a, which has been narrowly applied in New York; for example, New York courts have previously held that things such as psychological and optometric care are not “medical care.” As this was not medical treatment under New York law, any injury caused by the plaintiff's chiropractic care was subject to the three-year statute of limitations set forth in CPLR ' 214(6), which governs professional malpractice claims other than those concerning medical, dental or podiatric care. The Appellate Division explained that, had the patient been referred to the chiropractor by a licensed physician the result would have been different as, under that circumstance, the chiropractic care provided would have been considered an integral part of the patient's medical care.

Chiropractic Care Is Not Necessarily 'Medical' Care

A unanimous panel of New York's Appellate Division has declared that the statute of limitations for suing a chiropractor for malpractice in the State is three years, not the two-and-a-half years prescribed by statute as the limitations period for medical, dental and podiatric malpractice. Perez v. Fitzgerald, 305261/09, 2014 NY Slip Op 00744 (App. Div. 1St Dept., 2/6/14).

The plaintiff began seeing the defendant chiropractor in 2005 for treatment of neck and back pain following a car accident. At some time during the patient's course of treatment, the chiropractor ordered an MRI but did not read the results herself, instead relying on a report from the radiologist. The patient saw another chiropractor in 2008, who ordered a second MRI ' this one showed that the plaintiff had a tumor on her spine, which required surgical removal. The plaintiff then sued her first chiropractor, alleging that she was negligent in not diagnosing the tumor with the first, unread, MRI.

The defendant chiropractor moved for dismissal, asserting that the misdiagnosis, if any, took place more than two and a half years prior to the filing of the suit, so that the lawsuit was untimely under New York's Civil Practice Law and Rules (CPLR) ' 214-a. That statute says that any lawsuit for medical, dental or podiatric malpractice must be filed within two and a half years of the alleged negligence. The trial court dismissed the suit.

The appeals court reversed. It pointed to a 1986 case that addressed the nature of chiropractic services; it said that the issue “as to whether [the defendant chiropractor's] services constituted medical treatment” was a question of fact for the jury (Foote v Picinich, 118 AD2d 156, 157 (3d Dept 1986)). That question turns on whether the treatment is incident to medical care. Here, the appeals court found that the plaintiff's chiropractic treatment was not medical treatment because it “was not an integral part of the process of rendering medical treatment to a patient or substantially related to any medical treatment provided by a physician.” Thus, claims related to this care were not subject to the shortened limitations period of CPLR ' 214-a, which has been narrowly applied in New York; for example, New York courts have previously held that things such as psychological and optometric care are not “medical care.” As this was not medical treatment under New York law, any injury caused by the plaintiff's chiropractic care was subject to the three-year statute of limitations set forth in CPLR ' 214(6), which governs professional malpractice claims other than those concerning medical, dental or podiatric care. The Appellate Division explained that, had the patient been referred to the chiropractor by a licensed physician the result would have been different as, under that circumstance, the chiropractic care provided would have been considered an integral part of the patient's medical care.