Ault v. Ross General Hospital

DOOLING, J. Plaintiff, Mrs. Ault (hereinafter called the patient), and her husband sued defendant hospital for injuries received by the patient when she fell while getting [79]out of bed at night in an unlighted room in the hospital. The trial before a jury resulted in a verdict for defendant and plaintiffs appeal from the judgment entered thereon.

The patient had been admitted to undergo an operation for cataracts on her eyes. Her physician gave the hospital no instructions that they should exercise any unusual precautions with the patient. There is evidence that a nurse’s aid had shown the patient the call button pinned to the sheet beside her pillow, and had instructed her to stay in bed and to use the call light if she needed anything in the night. There was an electric light at the head of the bed operated by a pull-chain. The patient’s own physician testified that while the patient’s eyesight was greatly impaired “she identified a letter six inches in height at a distance of about 15 feet.” In a lighted room he would expect her to see a stool that was under a bed at a distance in excess of 6 feet. During the night, without using the call bell or turning on the light, the patient started to get out of bed in the darkness. She put down her right foot upon an object which felt like a stool. She determined that it was a stool because she felt that it was higher than the floor. “ Q. So that I may follow your testimony a little better, is it true that you placed your right foot on this object, and while you were attempting to put your left foot on the floor, it threw you 1 A. That is right. ’ ’ These stools were ordinarily kept under the bed “because we bump them in the dark otherwise. ’ ’ Many of the facts above recited were contradicted by other testimony but, following the familiar rule, those most favorable to the judgment must be accepted on appeal.

These facts presented both defendant’s negligence and the patient’s contributory negligence as questions for the jury’s determination. Whether it was contributory negligence for the patient to attempt to get out of bed in the darkness in a strange hospital room, and whether after her right foot rested on an object which felt like a stool it was contributory negligence to place her weight on this unfamiliar object while attempting to put her left foot on the floor presented jury questions. Whether it was negligence to leave the stool at the side of the bed when the stool would be visible to the patient if the room was lighted, and after instructing the patient not to get out of bed but to press the call button if she needed anything in the night, was equally a question for the jury. Appellants say in their opening brief: ‘ ‘ Obviously, the presence of the stools or benches in the room to which she was