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Estate of Betty Jean Shinholster v. Annapolis Hospital7/30/2004
(b) The percentage of the total fault of all persons that contributed to the death or injury, including each plaintiff . . . .
(2) In determining the percentages of fault under subsection (1)(b), the trier of fact shall consider both the nature of the conduct of each person at fault and the extent of the causal relation between the conduct and the damages claimed.
(6) If an action includes a medical malpractice claim against a person or entity described in section 5838a(1), 1 of the following applies:
(a) If the plaintiff is determined to be without fault under subsections (1) and (2), the liability of each defendant is joint and several
(b) If the plaintiff is determined to have fault under subsections (1) and (2) . . . the court shall determine whether all or part of a party's share of the obligation is uncollectible from that party, and shall reallocate any uncollectible amount among the other parties
(8) As used in this section, "fault" includes an act, an omission, conduct, including intentional conduct, a breach of warranty, or a breach of a legal duty, or any conduct that could give rise to the imposition of strict liability, that is a proximate cause of damage sustained by a party.
On the basis of this statute, defendants contend that the trial court erred in not allowing the jury to consider Shinholster's behavior as manifesting comparative negligence when she failed to regularly take her prescribed blood pressure medication for at least a year before her first visit to the emergency room.
While the Court of Appeals acknowledged that § 6304, on its face, requires a trier of fact to consider such negligence, it nonetheless relied on inferences drawn from this Court's decision in Podvin v Eickhorst, 373 Mich 175; 128 NW2d 523 (1964), and authority from other states to reach its holding that the statute did not control the situation.
The Court of Appeals erred, in our judgment. Subsection 6304(1)(b) is unambiguous and calls for the trier of fact to assess by percentage "the total fault of all persons that contributed to the death or injury, including each plaintiff," (emphasis added), as long as that fault constituted a proximate cause of the plaintiff's injury and subsequent damage.
With regard to what cause constitutes proximate cause, in Parks v Starks, 342 Mich 443, 448; 70 NW2d 805 (1955), we quoted with approval the following from 38 Am Jur, Negligence, § 55, p 703:
"The proximate cause of an injury is not necessarily the immediate cause; not necessarily the cause nearest in time, distance, or space. Assuming that there is a direct, natural, and continuous sequence between an act and an injury, * * * the act can be accepted as the proximate cause of the injury without reference to its separation from the injury in point of time or distance."
Thus, under § 6304, if a defendant presents evidence that would allow a reasonable person to conclude that a plaintiff's negligence constituted a proximate cause of her injury and subsequent damage, the trier of fact must be allowed to consider such evidence in apportioning fault.
With regard to the Court of Appeals and Justice CAVANAGH and Justice WEAVER'S reliance, in their concurrence/dissents, on out-of-state authority reaching a different conclusion than our Legislature did on this issue, we presume that the legislators were aware of those approaches and chose to depart from them in establishing Michigan law.
Moreover, the Court of Appeals reliance on inferences drawn from Podvin (the plaintiff's negligence in causing a car accident could not be cited as contributory negligence
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