This morning the New York Court of Appeals published its decision in Perl v. Meher and provided clarity to the trial courts on whether lawsuits stemming from motor vehicle accidents should be permitted to continue to trial.
For years,
many injured people were unable to get their “day in court” because they were
not able to establish that they sustained a “serious injury” under New York
Ins. Law §5102(d) the No Fault Threshold.
Until today, injured people had to establish by “objective proof” of the
injury shortly after the accident, namely that a medical doctor took objective
measurements of lost range of motion and strength. The statement in the chart that the patient
has “significant” lost range of motion/diminished strength was legally
insufficient under the prevailing law.
The problem was that medical doctors are primarily concerned with
treating the patient and not with tailoring the medical records to withstand
judicial scrutiny on the chance that the patient may pursue a lawsuit. As a result, many deserving patients’
lawsuits were dismissed on this technicality.
This was a huge tactical advantage for the automobile insurance carriers
(GEICO, Allstate, State Farm etc.) and “Threshold Motions” were common place in
motor vehicle lawsuits.
The Perl
Decision takes into account that doctors may not be aware of the technicalities
of documenting the medical chart to establish the contemporaneous “objective”
measurements of lost range of motion and strength. The treating physician must still make some “qualitative”
assessment of the plaintiff’s condition contemporaneous with the car
accident. However, the measurements of
the severity of the injury can wait until a later date – after the patient has
an opportunity to benefit from treatment.
The Perl case is a big step towards keeping the Courthouse doors
open to people injured in car accidents.
