Cases

Jens Koepke and Robin Meadow secured an affirmance in this medical staff privileges case. It arose from the summary suspension and eventual termination of staff privileges for a psychiatrist at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, with a peer review process that lasted almost four years.

The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s denial of the physician’s petition for writ of mandate, adopting the reasoning in GMSR’s briefs. The court relied extensively on Weinberg v. Cedars-Sinai Medical Center (2004) 119 Cal.App.4th 1098, another staff privileges case in which GMSR successfully represented the hospital. But it also plows some new ground on how courts should review summary suspensions, and it construes recently-enacted Business and Professions Code section 2282.5, which concerns the relationship between hospitals and their physicians in the peer review system.