Mathis v. RMSI Medical Services, et al

Filing 34

ORDER: (1) The Report and Recommendation (Docket No. 26) is hereby REJECTED; and (2) Defendant Hue La M.D.'s Motion to Dismiss for Failure to State a Claim (Docket No. 10) is hereby DENIED. This case is returned to the Magistrate Judge for further pretrial case management. It is SO ORDERED. Signed by Chief Judge Kevin H. Sharp on 8/12/16. (xc:Pro se party by regular and certified mail.)(DOCKET TEXT SUMMARY ONLY-ATTORNEYS MUST OPEN THE PDF AND READ THE ORDER.)(af)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
MIDDLE DISTRICT OF TENNESSEE
NASHVILLE DIVISION
DOUGLAS M. MATHIS, #319981,

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Plaintiff,
v.
RMSI MEDICAL SERVICES, et al.,
Defendants.

No. 3:15-00732
Judge Sharp

ORDER
The Magistrate Judge has issued a Report and Recommendation (“R & R”) in which he
recommends that the Motion to Dismiss filed by Defendant Hue La, M.D. (Docket No. 10) be granted
and that this case be dismissed. Plaintiff has filed Objections to the R & R (Docket No. 33).
The basis for the recommended dismissal is as follows:
. . . Plaintiff’s Complaint, Response, and Sur-Reply contain conflicting statements
concerning his receipt of medical care for his knee. See Docket Nos. 1, 17, 19. Plaintiff
argues both that he was denied a brace and surgery, and also that he did receive, inter
alia, an MRI, surgery, shots, a brace, repeated doctor’s visits, and repeated referrals to
an orthopedist. See id. When, as here, pleadings contain inconsistent allegations, “it is
Plaintiff’s admissions that matter when considering whether Plaintiff’s claim is legally
sufficient to survive a motion to dismiss.” See Guest-Marcotte v. Life Ins. Co. Of North
America, 2015 WL 4644936, at *8 (E.D. Mich. 2015) (slip copy), citing Malibu Media,
LLC v. Sanchez, 2014 WL 172301, at *3 (E.D. Mich. 2014). Accordingly, Plaintiff did
receive, inter alia, an MRI, surgery, shots, a brace, repeated doctor’s visits, and repeated
referrals to an orthopedist. See Docket Nos. 1, 17, 19.
Taking as true that Plaintiff received medical care for his knee, Plaintiff instead argues
that Defendant is liable because he delayed his knee surgery. Id. In order to hold
Defendant liable for deliberate indifference caused by delayed treatment, Plaintiff must
establish a detrimental effect caused by that alleged delay. Plaintiff’s argued harm in
the instant action is prospective; that is, he alleges that if his knee is “not fixed in three
(3) years, [he] would be crippled.” Docket No. 1, ¶¶ 9, 22 (emphasis added).
Because the harm of which Plaintiff complains is prospective, and because Plaintiff did
receive treatment (including surgery), Plaintiff has failed to show that Defendant was
deliberately indifferent to his serious medical needs. Because Plaintiff can not establish
that Defendant violated his constitutional rights, he cannot sustain his claim and this

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action should be dismissed.
(Docket No. 26 at 10-11).

Upon de novo review, the Court respectfully disagrees with the

recommended disposition at this juncture.
To be sure, the Complaint is not a model of clarity, but Plaintiff is proceeding pro se and
entitled to a certain amount of indulgence. Indeed, “[a] document filed pro se is ‘to be liberally
construed,’ and ‘pro se complaint, however inartfully pleaded, must be held to less stringent standards
than formal pleadings drafted by lawyers.” Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 94 (2007); see
Whitehouse v. Piazza, 397 F. Supp. 2d 935, 941 (N.D. Ill. 2005) (“it is not uncommon for a plaintiff
to have inconsistencies within the body of one complaint or between complaints”).
Further, and as the Magistrate Judge points out, “Plaintiff must establish a detrimental effect
caused by th[e] alleged delay” in the treatment of his knee, but the time for making that showing is not
now. Rather, “[a] prisoner has adequately stated a cause of action ‘when he alleges that prison
authorities have denied reasonable requests for medical treatment in the face of an obvious need for
such attention where the inmate is thereby exposed to undue suffering or the threat of tangible residual
injury.’” Scott v. Ambani, 577 F.3d 642, 648 (6th Cir. 2009). As this Court pointed out in its initial
screening pursuant to the Prison Litigation Reform Act:
Construing the complaint liberally, the plaintiff alleges that Dr. La was responsible for
delaying his knee surgery for more than five months after an orthopedic specialist
determined the surgery to be both medically necessary and urgent. He further alleges
that because of the delay, he continues to experience problems with his knee and that
the specialist has informed him that because he waited so long for surgery he will
eventually be “crippled.”
(Docket No. 3 at 4). The fact that the harm may be “prospective” is not necessarily fatal: “An Eighth
Amendment claim may be premised on deliberate indifference to exposing an inmate to an
unreasonable risk of serious harm in the future.” Dodson v. Wilkinson, 304 F. App’x 434, 439 (6th Cir.
2008) (citing Helling v. McKinney, 509 U.S. 25, 36 (1993)); see Blosser v. Gilbert, 2009 WL 909557,

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at *11 (E.D. Mich. Mar. 31, 2009) (same).
As an alternative basis for dismissal, Defendant argues that Plaintiff’s Complaint sounds in state
tort law and that “[w]here a prisoner has received some medical attention and the dispute is over the
adequacy of the treatment, federal courts are generally reluctant to second guess medical judgments and
to constitutionalize claims that sound in state tort law.” Graham ex rel. Estate of Graham v. Cty.
Washtenaw, 358 F.3d 377, 385 (6th Cir. 2004). But whether this is really a negligence action (if even
that) is something best decided in the context of a Motion for Summary Judgment. Indeed, Graham,
and Reid v. Sapp, 84 Fed. App’x 550 (6th Cir. 2003), which Defendant states is “a case with facts highly
anlaogous to those alleged here,” (Docket No. 11 at 11) were both decided in the context of summary
judgment.
Admittedly, Plaintiff may have a tough row to hoe in presenting a triable issue on whether he
was subjected to deliberate indifference, and this case may well be subject to dismissal on summary
judgment. However, the Court finds that dismissal based on the pleadings is unwarranted.
Accordingly, the Court rules as follows:
(1) The Report and Recommendation (Docket No. 26) is hereby REJECTED; and
(2) Defendant Hue La M.D.’s Motion to Dismiss for Failure to State a Claim (Docket No. 10)
is hereby DENIED.
This case is returned to the Magistrate Judge for further pretrial case management.
It is SO ORDERED.

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KEVIN H. SHARP
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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