Also known as: medical standards of care · standard of care
Written by attorneys · grounded in primary & secondary sources — see below
A professional duty requiring a physician to possess and exercise the degree of skill, care, and diligence that is customarily exercised by competent practitioners in the same specialty under similar circumstances. Expert testimony is ordinarily required to establish the content of that standard and to show whether the physician met it.
Mina Mehta, an emergency physician, left a patient with clear signs of internal bleeding unattended for hours while she handled routine paperwork. The patient died. Prosecutors charged Mehta with involuntary manslaughter, alleging her inaction constituted a gross deviation from the medical standard of care that created a high risk of death.
Melissa Mills, a general surgeon, failed to order a preoperative blood-type cross-match despite the patient's known clotting disorder and the scheduled major abdominal procedure. The patient hemorrhaged on the table and died. The state charged Mills with negligent homicide, claiming she should have perceived the substantial risk that her omission created.
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Monica Morgan, a seventeen-year-old hospital orderly, was permitted to transport a critically ill infant between units without supervision. The infant suffered permanent brain damage when the oxygen tank ran empty. The family sued, and the court applied the adult reasonable-person standard because transporting unstable patients is an adult medical activity.
Meredith Maxwell underwent robotic surgery performed by Dr. Miguel Mendoza. Mendoza never disclosed the known risk of bowel perforation that occurs in five percent of such procedures at his hospital. After suffering that exact complication, Maxwell sued for lack of informed consent, claiming Mendoza violated the medical standard of care by failing to discuss material risks.
Monarch Pharmaceuticals sold a pacemaker lead whose design complied with federal manufacturing regulations. A patient suffered lead fracture and sued, alleging the design fell below the medical standard of care. The manufacturer moved for summary judgment on preemption grounds, arguing federal requirements displaced any state tort standard.
Matrix Technologies hired Michelle Murphy, a paid workflow consultant, to redesign an operating-room layout. Murphy omitted standard sponge-count and instrument-tracking procedures used by comparable hospitals. A retained sponge caused a patient's fatal infection. The hospital sued Murphy, alleging breach of the professional standard of care expected of a compensated medical-systems consultant.
The traditional rule looked only to the local medical community where the physician practiced. Most courts now apply a broader standard drawn from the same or similar communities, and some jurisdictions have adopted a national standard.
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Yes. Because the standard is defined by medical custom rather than ordinary reasonable-person care, expert testimony is necessary to establish both the content of the standard and whether the defendant physician met it.
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Yes. A specialist must meet the standard of care customarily exercised by competent practitioners in that same specialty, not merely the standard applicable to general practitioners.
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…concluded that the States could constitutionally allow private individuals to recover damages for defamation on the basis of any standard of care except liability without fault. MR. JUSTICE MARSHALL dissented in Rosenbloom in an opinion joined by MR. JUSTICE STEWART. Id., at 78 . He thought that the plurality's "public or general…