Virginia's high court is asked to rule on immunity for doctors
The state Supreme Court is being asked to decide whether hundreds of doctors are immune from negligence suits in the care they provide at Virginia's three teaching hospitals. At issue is the largely abandoned, decades-old protection of charitable immunity, remnants of which are being used by tax-exempt foundations and the doctors they employ to plead immunity from malpractice suits. Lower courts across the state have issued opposite opinions on the defense. In a rare effort to settle the conflict before trial, lawyers representing physicians employed by the University of Virginia Health Services Foundation and lawyers for two former patients, one who died in the hospital and another who was permanently injured, have asked the state's highest court to intervene. The court is expected to decide whether to hear the case this spring.
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