Eugene R. Naylor and Gaye Nell Currie successfully defended appeal by plaintiff of trial court dismissal of plaintiff’s lawsuit against hospital.

The Mississippi Supreme Court handed down its opinion in Vaughn v. Mississippi Baptist Medical Center Inc., October 29, 2009, affirming the trial court’s order striking plaintiff’s nursing expert and granting summary judgment in favor of MBMC.

The Supreme Court, in an opinion that established precedent in Mississippi, declared that nurses were not qualified to give medical opinions on issues of causation between alleged standard of care issues and damages.

This holding is likely to benefit hospitals throughout the state, as it is now established that plaintiffs may not rely upon nursing experts alone to prove claims of nursing negligence, but that physician testimony is necessary to establish the causal link between alleged negligence and medical injury.