NY appeals court reinstates malpractice lawsuit

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A state appeals court has reinstated a medical malpractice lawsuit against one doctor, while dismissing the other defendants.

Plaintiffs Leonard Mazurkiewicz and Jennylu Mazurkiewicz filed a complaint seeking damages for injuries Leonard Mazurkiewicz allegedly suffered as the result of an alleged delay in detecting and properly treating a stroke at Mercy Hospital of Buffalo.

The original defendants were Mercy Hospital, Dr. William M. Coplin, Dr. Nathaniel P. Billings, and nurse practitioner Nicole Wedzina.

Billings moved for summary judgment dismissing the complaint against him. Mercy Hospital, Coplin, and Wedzina also moved for summary judgment dismissing the complaint against them.

In September 2024, state Supreme Court Justice Emilio Colaiacovo, in Erie County, granted Billings’ motion for summary judgment dismissing the complaint against him.

Colaiacovo dismissed the complaint against Wedzina, but not the hospital or Coplin.

The ruling was appealed to the Appellate Division of state Supreme Court, Fourth Department, which unanimously dismissed the case against Mercy Hospital, Coplin, and Wedzina, but denied Billings’ motion, and reinstated the complaint against him.

The Fourth Department dismissed those defendants because the plaintiffs failed to provide an adequate record to permit meaningful appellate review.

“It is the obligation of the appellant to assemble a proper record on appeal. The record must contain all of the relevant papers that were before the court,” the Fourth Department wrote.

“The record does not contain the Mercy defendants’ answer or their motion papers and exhibits. Also, notably absent from the record is plaintiffs’ bill of particulars detailing their allegations of negligence against Wedzina,” the court wrote.

“We agree with plaintiffs that the court erred in granting Billings’s motion, and we therefore modify the order accordingly,” the panel wrote.

“A defendant moving for summary judgment in a medical malpractice action has the burden of establishing the absence of any departure from good and accepted medical practice or that the plaintiff was not injured thereby,” according to the decision.

“Once the defendant meets the initial burden, the burden shifts to the plaintiff to raise a triable issue of fact, but only as to the elements on which the defendant met the prima facie burden,” the court wrote.

“Although the court properly determined that Billings met his initial burden on his motion with respect to the issues of deviation from the accepted standard of medical care and causation, we conclude that plaintiffs raised triable issues of fact in opposition as to both issues through the submission of the affidavit of an expert neurologist and the affirmation of an expert in emergency medicine,” the court wrote.

“Plaintiffs’ experts raised issues of fact with respect to whether plaintiff was still within the period of efficacy for certain treatments … such that Billings should have promptly ordered those treatments,” the court wrote.

“Inasmuch as plaintiffs’ expert submissions squarely opposed the moving party’s expert submissions, the result is a classic battle of the experts that is properly left to a jury for resolution,” the court wrote.

“This is not a case in which plaintiffs’ expert submissions are vague, conclusory, speculative, and unsupported by the medical evidence in the record before us,” the panel wrote.

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