A decision this month by a state supreme court overturned a lower court ruling that discounted a patient’s unsafe behavior from a medical liability determination.
In Kelly v. Haralampopoulos, two Colorado physicians were accused of medical liability when a patient experienced cardiac arrest during a procedure after presenting with abdominal pain. Testimony of close friends indicated that the patient had been recreationally using a dangerous drug that is known to cause cardiac arrest.
The trial court allowed this testimony to be considered in the jury’s verdict, which was decided for the physician defendants. When the case moved to a court of appeals, however, the testimony was denied and the decision overturned.
The physicians appealed to the Colorado Supreme Court, which upheld the decision of the trial court, in a ruling upholding that patients can be at least partially responsible for their health outcomes as a result of their own unhealthy behavior.
The Litigation Center of the AMA and State Medical Societies supported the physicians in a friend-of-the-court brief.
