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Senate committee hears debate on bill to restore pre‑Cayman medical‑malpractice jury instruction
Summary
Lawmakers and medical groups sparred over House Bill 342, which would codify a pattern jury instruction that sponsors say restores the prior standard for medical‑malpractice duty after the Montana Supreme Court’s Cayman decision; physicians warned of lost rural providers, opponents called the change unnecessary and legally intrusive.
Representative Bill Mercer urged the Senate Business and Labor Committee to concur on House Bill 342, saying it would ‘‘reset’’ how juries are instructed in medical‑malpractice cases so the standard of care is determined by expert testimony rather than a foreseeability‑based instruction adopted by the Montana Supreme Court in Cayman v. Glacier Eye Clinic.
Mercer told the committee the bill would reestablish a longstanding jury instruction that asks whether a provider used the learning and skill ‘‘ordinarily used by doctors practicing in the same or a similar community’’ and that the Cayman decision introduced a higher or different…
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