G.C. was born at Shands Jacksonville Medical Center, Inc. G.C. suffered a brain injury due to oxygen deprivation around the time of her birth, and she later was diagnosed with severe cerebral palsy. The parents, on their own and on behalf of G.C., originally petitioned for compensation under the Florida Birth-Related Neurological Injury Compensation Plan (“Plan”). The petition prayed for the award of payment for medical services and expenses for G.C. as provided by statute for a “birth-related neurological injury” (“BRNI”), as that type of injury is defined by section 766.302(2), Florida Statutes (2017).
A board of directors, appointed by the State’s Chief Financial Officer and operating as an association (loosely called “NICA”), administers the Plan “in a manner that promotes and protects the health and best interests of children with birth-related neurological injuries [BRNI],” which the Legislature defines in terms of a “brain or spinal cord” injury to a baby of a specified minimum weight, “caused by oxygen deprivation or mechanical injury” that occurs during “labor, delivery, or resuscitation,” that leaves the baby “permanently and substantially mentally and physically impaired.”
NICA investigated the claim and obtained medical reviews by two physicians, one whom opined that that G.C. did “not fulfill criteria of a substantial mental impairment.” Based on the reviews, NICA denied that the Chavezes’ claim was compensable because G.C.’s injury did meet the definition of a BRNI. Shands, which also employed the nursing and
support staff involved in G.C.’s delivery, sought to intervene. The University of Florida Board of Trustees (“UF”), which employed the physician involved, sought to intervene as well. The Chavezes did not object, and the administrative law judge (“ALJ”) allowed both interventions. These two provider-intervenors jointly asserted, based on their review of the
medical records, that the Chavezes’ claim was compensable.
The ALJ entered his final order, effectively confirming the Chavezes’ modified position and determining G.C. had not suffered a BRNI that was compensable under the Plan. The Chavezes did not challenge that determination; the intervenors Shands and UF did.
The First District Court of Appeal State of Florida held in its December 11, 2024 opinion: “there was no claim of a right to public funds, no live controversy over a claimed entitlement to official action authorized by statute. Once the Chavezes filed their amended petition disclaiming any entitlement to compensation, they in essence withdrew their assertion of a public right, and the ALJ lost authority to proceed further … The parties—the Chavezes and NICA—agreed that the infant had not suffered a BRNI and had no basis for entitlement to compensation under the Plan. There was no claim under the Plan—indeed, no dispute between the parties regarding Plan compensation—to be determined. Missing, then, was a government function under the Plan on which a fact determination by the ALJ depended … When the dispute between the Chavezes and NICA ended, and the parties agreed there was no public right to compensation, the claim was terminated, and Shands and UF were foreclosed from trying to further address it.”
“[T]here is a difference between a determination of a BRNI claim for compensation and a determination of the nature of a birth-related injury on which a medical malpractice suit is premised. The former is an adjudication necessary to enforce a public right and constitutes the exercise of quasi-judicial power. The latter is an adjudication of a fact on which the circuit court’s authority to render judgment on a private right of action turns. Absent a claim for compensation from the Chavezes, this latter factual adjudication becomes one of constitutional import: If an infant’s injury does satisfy the definition, then the constitutionally guaranteed access to courts for a tort remedy is barred; if not, then the right to sue in court for malpractice remains … the ALJ’s order here could have no preclusive or final effect, regarding whether G.C.’s injury was a BRNI outside (or even inside) the executive branch, certainly not where the order is unmoored from the performance of any legislatively assigned governmental function.”
“The order we have on review, then, was not a completed exercise of quasi-judicial power under the Plan—there being no claim for the ALJ to adjudicate, no official function to be facilitated by the power. This leaves the order as purely an advisory one, with no effect on the rights or privileges of any party within the executive branch. It is not administrative action adversely affecting the legal interests of Shands and UF.”
“There was no disputed claim for enforcement of a public right. Shands and UF, as intervenors, could not inject a controversy to be resolved, and they had no separate claim that the ALJ had the authority to conclusively resolve. There is no completed quasi-judicial action that could support our jurisdiction to consider their appeal.”
Source Shands Jacksonville Medical Center, Inc. v. Chavez, No. 1D2020-3605.
If you or your baby suffered a birth injury (or worse) during labor, delivery, or shortly after birth in Florida or in another U.S. state, you should promptly find a Florida birth injury lawyer, or a birth injury lawyer in your state, who may investigate your birth injury claim for you and represent you and your child in a birth injury medical malpractice case, if appropriate.
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