ANIL K THOMAS V HENRY FORD MACOMB HOSPITAL CORPORATION
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STATE OF MICHIGAN
COURT OF APPEALS
ANIL K. THOMAS and ARSENIO V. DELEON,
UNPUBLISHED
September 28, 2010
Plaintiffs-Appellants,
v
HENRY FORD MACOMB HOSPITAL
CORPORATION, d/b/a HENRY FORD
MACOMB HOSPITAL and TRINITY HEALTH
CORPORATION,
No. 290732
Oakland Circuit Court
LC No. 2008-091169-CK
Defendants-Appellees.
Before: SHAPIRO, P.J., and SAAD and SERVITTO, JJ.
SAAD, J. (concurring).
Though I concur in the result reached by the majority, I respectfully write separately
because there are further important reasons why plaintiffs’ claims should be rejected. First, the
alleged violation of the Medical Staff Bylaws, by the Medical Executive Committee (MEC)
(alleged failure to hold a meeting of the entire general staff), does not state a cause of action
against defendant hospital. Clearly, the hospital is not responsible for the MEC’s failure to hold
a meeting.
Moreover, irrespective of whether the MEC failed to convene a meeting of the general
staff, and regardless of the MEC’s non-binding recommendation regarding the upgrading of the
intensive care unit (ICU), the board of directors of the hospital has the unilateral right, indeed the
obligation, to make decisions regarding the upgrading of the ICU and enter into exclusive
contracts regarding the operation of the ICU. Michigan’s Public Health Code mandates that the
board is responsible for all phases of the operation of the hospital, including the selection of
medical staff MCL 333.21513(a), and the granting of privileges, MCL 333.215B(c)(d). Also, the
hospital by-laws grant the board, not the MEC, the ultimate and unilateral authority to make
exclusive professional service contracts for the hospital. See Art VII, § 11 of the hospital bylaws. Therefore, regardless of the alleged convening of a meeting and regardless of the MEC’s
recommendations, the board has the final authority to make such determinations and thus,
whether a meeting of the general staff was called or not is quite beside the point. Of course,
here, the MEC, which represents the doctors at the hospital, unanimously recommended the
upgrading of the ICU and the exclusive contract to a group of doctors from within the hospital,
all of whom met the new, more rigorous requirements for practice in the ICU.
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The suit boils down to the fact that one member of the MEC, plaintiff deLeon, objected to
upgrading the ICU (to meet the new, higher national standards promulgated by the American
College of Critical Medicine) and objected to the exclusive contract to a medical group that met
the higher standard, because he, deLeon, does not meet the more rigorous requirements to
practice intensive care medicine. Indeed, though the MEC and the hospital delayed
implementation of the preferred higher standards to give deLeon time to take the requisite tests,
deLeon flunked the tests and now contests the whole process because he does not meet the
higher standards. More to the point, deLeon desired the meeting in issue to reinstate his clinical
privileges in the ICU, despite his failure to meet the new standards, the MEC’s upgrade and
exclusive contract recommendations to the board (indeed, these recommendations are by his
fellow physicians), and despite the board’s statutory and by-law unilateral right and obligation to
make such improvements.
In other words, deLeon’s case is frivolous and, sadly, simply the result of his failure to
meet new and improved standards that benefit patients who are critically ill, who turn to this
hospital for special expertise.
/s/ Henry William Saad
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