Doctrine of Corporate Responsibility

*doctrine of corporate negligence as the judicial answer to the problem of

allocating hospitals liability for the negligent acts of health practitioners, absent
facts to support the application of respondeat superior or apparent authority.
*the duty of providing quality medical service is no longer the sole
prerogative and responsibility of the physician. The modern hospitals have
changed structure. Hospitals now tend to organize a highly professional medical
staff whose competence and performance need to be monitored by the hospitals
commensurate with their inherent responsibility to provide quality medical care.
*hospital is negligent if failing to have a sufficient number of trained
nurses attending the patient; failing to require a consultation with or
examination by members of the hospital staff; and failing to review the
treatment rendered to the patient.
*a hospitals corporate negligence extends to permitting a physician
known to be incompetent to practice at the hospital.
*With the passage of time, more duties were expected from hospitals, among
them: (1) the use of reasonable care in the maintenance of safe and adequate
facilities and equipment; (2) the selection and retention of competent
physicians; (3) the overseeing or supervision of all persons who practice
medicine within its walls; and (4) the formulation, adoption and enforcement of
adequate rules and policies that ensure quality care for its patients.
* a hospital has the duty to see that it meets the standards of responsibilities
for the care of patients. Such duty includes the proper supervision of the
members of its medical staff. A patient who enters a hospital does so with the
reasonable expectation that it will attempt to cure him. The hospital accordingly
has the duty to make a reasonable effort to monitor and oversee the treatment
prescribed and administered by the physicians practicing in its premises.
* A hospital has the duty to exercise reasonable care to protect from harm
all patients admitted into its facility for medical treatment.
*Under the doctrine of corporate responsibility, the duty of
providing quality medical service is no longer the sole prerogative and

responsibility of the physician. This is because the modern hospital now

tends to organize a highly-professional medical staf whose competence and
performance need also to be monitored by the hospital commensurate with
its inherent responsibility to provide quality medical care. Such responsibility
includes the proper supervision of the members of its medical
staf. Accordingly, the hospital has the duty to make a reasonable efort to
monitor and oversee the treatment prescribed and administered by the
physicians practicing in its premises.