SANTA CLARA, Calif. — The California Supreme Court on July 31 issued a decision clarifying that the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act, or MICRA, does not apply in all cases involving medical injury, significantly expanding the path to justice for victims of negligence.
MICRA, enacted in 1975 by the California Legislature, was intended to lower medical malpractice liability insurance premiums by reducing the potential tort liability of health care providers. But as Trial Lawyers for Justice noted, that premise “has not been proven accurate.” The law aimed to ensure continued patient access to medical professionals while capping compensation for malpractice victims at $250,000, regardless of the severity of harm. That cap remained in place until 2022, when the law was modernized.
In 2022, trial attorney and Trial Lawyers for Justice co-founder Nick Rowley reached an agreement with the California Medical Association to update the law’s damage caps. The agreement aimed to ensure that “victims of medical negligence are able to receive the compensation they deserve.”
The court’s recent ruling stems from the case Gutierrez v. Tostado, in which Francisco Gutierrez sued emergency medical technician Uriel Tostado and ProTransport-1, LLC. In January 2018, Gutierrez was driving on a California highway when Tostado, transporting a patient in an ambulance, rear-ended his truck. Gutierrez suffered neck and back injuries and filed suit in 2020, alleging general negligence involving a motor vehicle and seeking damages for personal injury and property damage.
The trial court ruled for the defense, stating the claim was barred under MICRA’s one-year statute of limitations and that Tostado was “rendering professional medical services that were within the scope of services he was licensed out to carry.”
Gutierrez appealed, but the appellate court upheld the ruling, asserting that MICRA “was not limited to suits by patients or to recipients of medical services as long as the plaintiff is injured due to negligence in the rendering of professional services and his injuries were foreseeable.”
The California Supreme Court ultimately reversed that decision. It held that “professional services, as defined under MICRA, encompassed any services performed by a health care provider within the scope of licensure,” but clarified that the law’s statute of limitations “extends only to claims deriving from the violation of an obligation owed by a health care provider in connection with the provision of professional services, as opposed to the breach of a duty that is more generally owed to the public at large.”
Because Gutierrez’s injuries stemmed from a breach of duty owed to the public rather than from professional medical care, the court ruled that MICRA’s limitations did not apply.
Clint Ehrlich, attorney for Gutierrez, praised the decision. “This landmark opinion affirms that healthcare providers, like everyone else, must be held accountable when they violate basic duties of care,” he said.
The court ruled that not every injury involving a health care provider constitutes medical malpractice under MICRA. As a result, victims of negligence will have greater opportunities to pursue claims in civil court without being constrained by the act’s previous limitations.
