## Facts

- Janet Gafner delivered her daughter, Shannon, at Down East Community Hospital on May 27, 1990; the delivery involved shoulder dystocia.
- The family alleged Shannon suffered a brachial plexus injury due to negligent management of the obstetric emergency.
- The family initiated a professional negligence claim under the Maine Health Security Act (MHSA) against the delivering physician and the hospital.
- In the MHSA prelitigation screening process, the panel chair issued (and later extended) an expert designation deadline to April 1, 1997.
- The family timely designated experts addressing the physician’s alleged negligence but did not designate any expert addressing the hospital’s liability by the deadline.
- Months after the deadline, the family designated an expert to support a theory that the hospital lacked written policies requiring physician consultation for certain high-risk deliveries.
- The hospital moved to dismiss for noncompliance with the chair’s discovery/scheduling order or, alternatively, to strike the late expert designation.
- The panel chair denied dismissal, struck the late expert designation, and the screening panel unanimously found no professional negligence by the hospital.
- In the subsequent Superior Court action, the family asserted hospital liability including a “corporate liability” theory premised on alleged policy failures; the court granted summary judgment to the hospital.

## Issues

1. Whether the panel chair abused discretion under the MHSA by denying a further extension and striking the late-designated hospital-liability expert.
2. Whether the Superior Court had authority under the MHSA to decide and grant the hospital’s motion for summary judgment after completion of the panel process.
3. Whether Maine should recognize an independent “corporate liability” cause of action against a hospital for alleged institutional policy failures.

## Decision

- The court held the panel chair did not abuse discretion by enforcing the expert designation deadline and striking the untimely expert designation.
- The court held the Superior Court retained authority to rule on dispositive motions, including summary judgment, after the MHSA panel process concluded.
- The court declined to adopt a standalone corporate liability doctrine against hospitals on the record presented.
- The judgment was affirmed in part, vacated in part, and remanded to allow any hospital-liability claims cognizable under existing Maine theories (as distinct from the rejected standalone corporate liability theory) to proceed if not otherwise resolved.

## Legal Principles

- Under the MHSA, the panel chair may issue and enforce discovery and scheduling orders in the screening process; exclusion of an untimely expert designation is a permissible sanction reviewed for abuse of discretion.
- A party’s failure to comply with expert designation deadlines—especially after an extension—can justify striking the expert to preserve orderly and fair proceedings.
- The MHSA screening procedure does not strip the Superior Court of ordinary adjudicatory power to resolve cases through civil procedure mechanisms, including summary judgment, once the matter is properly before the court.
- Maine does not recognize an independent, free-standing hospital “corporate liability” cause of action based solely on broad institutional policy duties where existing direct and vicarious negligence doctrines supply the governing framework.

## Conclusion

The court enforced MHSA expert-disclosure deadlines by approving exclusion of a late hospital-liability expert, confirmed that Superior Courts may grant summary judgment after panel screening, and rejected creation of a separate hospital corporate liability doctrine, while remanding to preserve any viable hospital-liability claims under existing Maine law.


Gafner v. Down E. Cmty. Hosp., 735 A.2d 969 (Me. 1999)