Professional Negligence Law Reporter

A New York appellate court held that an allergist was entitled to judgment as a matter of law and to a set-aside of a plaintiff’s verdict in a case alleging failure to communicate with a patient’s primary care physician.

Allergist Joseph Reiss diagnosed Joseph Hilt as having an allergic reaction to the ACE inhibitor Lisinopril. He instructed Hilt to stop taking the drug and confirmed that he was no longer taking the medicine in subsequent appointments. Hilt later died, and it was determined that an anaphylactic reaction to Lisinopril caused his death. Suit against Reiss alleged that he had failed to communicate with Hilt’s primary care physician, Adam Carpentieri, about his decision to have Hilt discontinue the Lisinopril and that this was a substantial factor in Hilt’s anaphylactic reaction and death. A jury found for the plaintiff, after which the defense moved to set aside the jury verdict and for judgment as a matter of law. The trial court granted in part and denied in part.

Reversing, the appellate court considered the defense argument that the failure to communicate with Carpentieri was not the proximate cause of Hilt’s death. The court found that although Carpentieri had refilled the Lisinopril prescription after Hilt had met with Reiss and confirmed that he had stopped taking the medication, the evidence shows that the prescription could not have reached Hilt’s home until after he had been hospitalized for the final time. Thus, the court concluded, there is no evidence in the record from which a jury could have concluded Reiss’s failure to communicate with Carpentieri was the proximate cause of Hilt’s death.

Consequently, the court held that the trial court should have granted the defense motion to set aside the jury verdict and for judgment as a matter of law.

Citation: Hilt v. Carpentieri, 2021 WL 4558386 (N.Y. App. Div. Oct. 6, 2021).