## Facts

- Terry Hedgepeth sought HIV testing at Whitman-Walker Clinic after learning his girlfriend was HIV-positive.
- The clinic drew blood and sent it to an off-site laboratory, which reported a “non-reactive” (HIV-negative) result.
- A clinic staff member misread the result and prepared documentation indicating Hedgepeth was HIV-positive.
- A physician at the clinic negligently informed Hedgepeth that he was HIV-positive, and he lived for approximately five years believing the diagnosis.
- Hedgepeth presented evidence that the mistaken diagnosis caused severe emotional harm, including clinical depression, suicidal thoughts, psychiatric hospitalization, medication use, employment repercussions, and family strain.
- Another clinic later informed Hedgepeth that he was not HIV-positive.
- Hedgepeth sued the clinic and the physician for negligent infliction of emotional distress (NIED), seeking recovery for emotional and related harms without an independent physical-injury claim.

## Issues

1. Whether District of Columbia law bars an NIED claim, absent physical injury, when the plaintiff was not placed in a “zone of physical danger.”
2. Whether a defendant may owe a duty to avoid negligently causing serious emotional distress when the defendant’s relationship or undertaking necessarily implicates the plaintiff’s emotional well-being and serious emotional distress is especially likely to result from negligence.

## Decision

- The en banc District of Columbia Court of Appeals reversed summary judgment for the clinic and physician and remanded.
- The court held the “zone of physical danger” test remains the general rule for NIED claims, but it should not be applied categorically to bar all claims lacking physical danger.
- The court adopted a limited supplemental duty rule permitting NIED recovery without physical danger in certain relationship- or undertaking-based contexts.
- Applying the supplemental rule, the court concluded that negligent communication of a highly consequential medical diagnosis within a physician–patient relationship could support an NIED claim even without physical endangerment.

## Legal Principles

- The District of Columbia’s “zone of physical danger” requirement for NIED remains generally applicable, primarily to constrain liability and address proof concerns.
- A limited supplemental basis for NIED duty exists when:
  - the defendant has an obligation to care for the plaintiff’s emotional well-being, or the plaintiff’s emotional well-being is necessarily implicated by the defendant’s undertaking or relationship with the plaintiff; and
  - serious emotional distress is especially likely to be caused by the defendant’s negligence.
- In medical contexts involving life-altering diagnoses, severe emotional harm from negligent misdiagnosis may be particularly foreseeable, supporting duty and potential liability even absent physical peril.

## Conclusion

The en banc court allowed Hedgepeth’s NIED claim to proceed, holding that while the zone-of-danger rule remains the default in the District of Columbia, a limited relationship-based duty can support liability for serious, foreseeable emotional distress caused by negligent medical misdiagnosis even without physical danger.


Hedgepeth v. Whitman-Walker Clinic, 22 A.3d 789 (D.C. 2011) (en banc)