Lopez v. American Medical Response West Expands MICRA to Negligent Driving

On March 15, 2023, Division 5 of the First District Court of Appeal filed its decision in Lopez v. American Medical Response West, affecting medical malpractice litigants and the personal injury realm at large.

In this case, Plaintiffs claimed injury when the ambulance in which they were transported collided with another vehicle. Plaintiffs sued for motor vehicle and medical negligence. The ambulance company moved for summary judgment based on the one-year MICRA statute of limitations (Code Civ. Proc., § 340.5). The trial court found that MICRA applied based on declarations from the emergency medical technicians establishing their certification, concluded the lawsuit was untimely, and granted summary judgment. Plaintiffs appealed.

The Court of Appeal affirmed. The court held that, under Canister v. Emergency Ambulance Service, Inc. (2008) 160 Cal.App.4th 388, transporting a patient by ambulance counts as providing “professional services” for purposes of applying the MICRA statute of limitations. Plaintiffs’ injuries resulted from the ambulance company’s alleged negligence in the “ ‘use or maintenance of equipment . . . integrally related to [plaintiffs’] medical diagnosis and treatment.’ ” The court explained that because MICRA applies to all injuries resulting from professional medical negligence regardless of whether an injured party was receiving medical treatment, it was immaterial that one of the plaintiffs was not a patient at the time of the accident.

Until this Lopez decision, it was questionable regarding whether Canister was still good law as it pre-dated the California Supreme Court’s decision in Flores v. Presbyterian Intercommunity Hospital (2016) 63 Cal.4th 75 in which the court held that whether negligence in maintaining hospital equipment or premises qualifies as professional negligence depends on the nature of the relationship between the premises in question and the provision of medical care to the plaintiff. Flores cautioned that MICRA did not apply to acts of ordinary negligence that play no part in the patients medical diagnosis or treatment.

After Lopez, it is possible that trial courts can view that a third-party, non-patient in a separate car injured by an ambulance transporting a patient will fall under MICRA. It is even possible that a trial court could find that an EMT negligently operating an ambulance without its lights on in a non-urgent, non-emergent drive could be considered professional malpractice.