| Lake v Kaleida Health |
| 2009 NY Slip Op 00789 [59 AD3d 966] |
| February 6, 2009 |
| Appellate Division, Fourth Department |
| Dale Lake et al., Respondents, v Kaleida Health, DoingBusiness as Millard Fillmore Gates Hospital, et al., Defendants, and Ram Prakash Sharma, M.D.,et al., Appellants. |
—[*1] Stamm, Reynolds & Stamm, Williamsville (Melissa A. Brewster of counsel), forplaintiffs-respondents.
Appeal from an order of the Supreme Court, Erie County (Diane Y. Devlin, J.), enteredOctober 23, 2007 in a medical malpractice action. The order denied the motion of defendantsRam Prakash Sharma, M.D. and Lisa Hastings, C.R.N.A. for summary judgment.
It is hereby ordered that the order so appealed from is unanimously reversed on the lawwithout costs, the motion is granted and the complaint against defendants Ram Prakash Sharma,M.D. and Lisa Hastings, C.R.N.A. is dismissed.
Memorandum: Plaintiffs commenced this medical malpractice action seeking damages forback injuries allegedly sustained by Dale Lake (plaintiff) when he was moved and/or positionedin connection with a surgical procedure performed on his left thumb. Supreme Court erred indenying the motion of Ram Prakash Sharma, M.D., the anesthesiologist, and Lisa Hastings,C.R.N.A., the anesthesia nurse (collectively, defendants), seeking summary judgment dismissingthe complaint against them. Defendants met their initial burden by submitting the affidavit of anexpert establishing that they did not deviate from accepted medial practice in their care andtreatment of plaintiff (see Darling vScott, 46 AD3d 1363, 1364 [2007]). Plaintiffs failed to raise a triable issue of fact bysubmitting the affidavit of an expert that contained only "[g]eneral allegations of medicalmalpractice, [which were] merely conclusory in nature and unsupported by competent evidencetending to establish the essential elements of [medical malpractice]" (Mendez v City of NewYork, 295 AD2d 487, 488 [2002]; see Alvarez v Prospect Hosp., 68 NY2d 320, 325[1986]). We further conclude that the record does not support plaintiffs' allegation that thealleged injuries to plaintiff could not occur in the absence of negligence and thus, contrary toplaintiffs' contention, the doctrine of res ipsa loquitur does not apply to defeat defendants' motion(see Hoffman v Pelletier, 6 AD3d889, 891 [2004]; Sapienza v County of Erie, 270 AD2d 907, 907-908 [2000]).Present—Scudder, P.J., Hurlbutt, Martoche, Green and Gorski, JJ.