PROFESSIONExclusive contracts part of bottom-line orientationIn the Courts. By Miles J. Zaremski and Ila S. Rothschild, amednews contributors. April 9, 2001. The Illinois Supreme Court recently addressed, in Garibaldi v. Applebaum, the issue of whether a hospital's decision to enter into an exclusive contract with a physician group triggered another physician's right to notice and hearing under the hospital bylaws. More specifically, the appeal considered "what procedural rights, if any, a physician has under hospital bylaws when a hospital enters into an exclusive contract with a group of competing physicians for the performance of the same work as the physician performs." Abel Garibaldi, MD, a board-certified cardiovascular surgeon, had clinical privileges at St. Francis Hospital and Health Center in Blue Island, Ill. Dr. Garibaldi had been a member of a cardiovascular group that, due to differences among its members, dissolved. A new group was formed that did not include him. Thereafter, a member of the newly formed group, Robert Applebaum, MD, entered into an exclusive contract with the hospital that allowed only himself, employees of the new group and those who subcontracted with him to perform open heart surgery at the hospital. Dr. Garibaldi claimed that the effect of the exclusive contract was to revoke his right to perform open heart procedures at the hospital without affording him the benefit of notice and a hearing, in violation of the hospital's then current bylaws. He filed suit against St. Francis, Dr. Applebaum and two other physicians seeking declaratory and injunctive relief. After a trial court dismissed the action, it was reinstated by an Illinois appellate court. That court held that the hospital's decision to enter into the exclusive contract with the new cardiovascular group effectively revoked Dr. Garibaldi's hospital privileges; accordingly, he should have had notice and a hearing before the contract with Dr. Applebaum ever became effective.
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Copyright 2001 American Medical Association. All rights reserved.
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