Christina Yarbrough and David Goodpaster brought a medical negligence lawsuit against Northwestern Memorial Hospital (NMH) and Northwestern Medical Faculty Foundation (NMFF) after the premature birth of their daughter, Hayley Joe Goodpaster. This case came to the Illinois Appellate Court by the request of NMH regarding the doctrine of apparent authority in the medical negligence context. The trial court certified a question of law pursuant to Illinois Supreme Court Rule 308.
The question was this: “Can a hospital be held vicariously liable under the doctrine of apparent agency set forth in Gilbert v. Sycamore Mun. Hosp., 156 Ill.2d 511 (Ill. 1993), and its progeny for the acts of the employees of an unrelated, independent clinic that is not a party to the present litigation?”
The case involved Christina Yarbrough, who believed she was pregnant. She went to Erie Family Health Center Inc. (Erie) a federally funded, not-for-profit clinic on Nov. 14, 2005 after searching the Internet for a nearby clinic offering free pregnancy testing. After receiving a positive pregnancy test, healthcare workers at Erie inquired where Yarbrough would receive prenatal care. Yarbrough was advised that if she obtained prenatal care from Erie, she would deliver at NMH and would receive testing and additional care at NMH, including ultrasounds. She was given a pamphlet and a flyer with information regarding scheduling tours and classes at NMH. The plaintiffs in this case alleged that based on her knowledge of NMH’s reputation and the information provided by Erie, Yarbrough believed that if she received prenatal care from Erie, she would be receiving treatment from NMH health care workers.
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