Raquel Reeves, Plaintiff, v. DEAN STRAFF VAISHALI SAINI DANIELA URICH SUSAN GAUTHIER NEW YORK PRESBYTERIAN HOSPITAL (2026)

Recitation, as required by CPLR 2219 (a), of the papers considered in the review:

NYSCEF #s: 118-134, 136-141, 142-143

Defendants Richard I. Lappin, M.D. ("Dr. Lappin"), Dean Straff, M.D. ("Dr. Straff"), Vaishali Saini, M.D. ("Dr. Saini), Daniela Urich, M.D. ("Dr. Urich"), Susan Gauthier, D.O. ("Dr. Gauthier"), and New York Presbyterian Hospital ("NYPH") move for an Order, pursuant to CPLR 2221 (e), to renew Defendants' prior motion to dismiss, and upon renewal, to dismiss Plaintiff's Complaint in its entirety as time-barred by the statute of limitations pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a) (5) and CPLR 214-a.

Prior to the completion of discovery, Defendants initially moved to dismiss (Seq. No. 1) on the grounds raised in the instant motion. In a short order dated November 20, 2018, Hon. Ellen Spodek, J.S.C. denied the motion with leave to renew upon completion of further discovery, including discovery related to the alleged relationship between Defendants and nonparty Marc Dinkin, M.D. ("Dr. Dinkin").

Plaintiff does not oppose the part of this motion seeking to renew the motion to dismiss following the competition of discovery as directed in the prior justice's decision and order. Plaintiff also does not address or submit any opposition to the part of the motion seeking to dismiss the third cause of action for negligent hiring.

Plaintiff commenced this action on March 30, 2016, asserting claims of medical malpractice and lack of informed consent  ¹ . These claims arise from Plaintiff's treatment and care at the NYPH from June 13, 2013 through June 15, 2013, and the alleged failure of the defendant physicians to timely diagnose and treat idiopathic intracranial hypertension ("IIH"). She was treated during this period by defendants Dr. Lappin (emergency attending physician), Dr. Straff (emergency attending physician), Dr. Urich (anesthesiology resident), Dr. Saini (neurology resident), and Dr. Gauthier (neurology attending). Plaintiff did not see Dr. Urich, Dr. Saini, or Dr. Gauthier after June 15, 2013.

Subsequently, Plaintiff returned to the NYPH emergency department on June 27, 2013 and was evaluated and treated again by Dr. Lappin. She was admitted to the medical/neurology unit. During that admission, she was diagnosed with IIH and referred to nonparty neuro-ophthalmologist Dr. Dinkin, who she saw following her discharge on July 2, 2013. She was not treated by Dr. Lappin after that admission.

Defendant Dr. Straff again treated Plaintiff as the emergency department attending physician on February 11, 2014, when she returned experiencing vision changes. She was admitted to the neurology unit and discharged on February 14, 2014.

Since July 2013, Plaintiff has continued to see nonparty Dr. Dinkin for visual field testing, optical coherence tomography, and referral to a surgeon for a fenestration procedure. She followed up with Dr. Dinkin through at least February 2018 (after this action was commenced), and set forth in a personal affirmation dated January 12, 2026 that she currently sees him "every six months to one year."

In the instant motion, Defendants argue that all claims against them are time-barred by the statute of limitations. In addition to other evidence, the movants submit an affidavit from Leighann D'Alessandro, a NYPH human resources employee, affirming that nonparty Dr. Dinkin was not an employee of NYPH. They argue that his subsequent treatment of Plaintiff should not be imputed to the defendants.

"On a motion to dismiss a complaint pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a) (5) on the ground that the statute of limitations has expired, the moving defendant must establish, prima facie, that the time in which to commence the action has expired. If such prima facie showing is made, the burden then shifts to the plaintiff to raise a question of fact as to whether the statute of limitations is tolled or is otherwise inapplicable." (RTT Holdings, LLC v Nacht, 206 AD3d 834, 835 [2d Dept 2022] [internal citations omitted].)

The statute of limitations for a medical malpractice action is two years and six months from "the act, omission, or failure complained of or last treatment where there is continuous treatment for the same illness, injury or condition which gave rise to the said act, omission or failure" (CPLR 214-a).

The records indicate that Plaintiff was last treated by neurology resident Dr. Saini, anesthesiology resident Dr. Ulrich, and neurology attending physician Dr. Gauthier on or before June 15, 2013. When she returned to NYPH less than two weeks later, she was treated by emergency attending physician Dr. Lappin on June 27, 2013. Based on the June 27, 2013 date, the statute of limitations expired at latest on December 27, 2015, over three months before this action was commenced on March 30, 2016.

The movants have met their initial burden of establishing that the statute of limitations expired for Plaintiff's medical malpractice claims against Dr. Saini, Dr. Ulrich, Dr. Gauthier, and Dr. Lappin. Defendants have also established that the claims against NYPH based on vicarious liability for those individual defendants are also time-barred. The burden shifts to Plaintiff to raise a triable issue of fact.

"Under the continuous treatment doctrine, the limitations period does not begin to run until the end of the course of treatment if three conditions are met: (1) the patient continued to seek, and in fact obtained, an actual course of treatment from the defendant physician during the relevant period; (2) the course of treatment was for the same conditions or complaints underlying the plaintiff's medical malpractice claim; and (3) the treatment is continuous" (Chvetsova v Family Smile Dental, 202 AD3d 657, 658-659 [2d Dept 2022] [internal citations and quotation marks omitted]). The third element is demonstrated "when further treatment is explicitly anticipated by both physician and patient" (id.).

The policy behind the continuous treatment doctrine "seeks to maintain the physician-patient relationship in the belief that the most efficacious medical care will be obtained when the attending physician remains on a case from onset to cure. Implicit in the policy is the recognition that the doctor not only is in a position to identify and correct his or her malpractice, but is best placed to do so." (McDermott v Torre, 56 NY2d 399, 407-408 [1982] [internal citations omitted]). The doctrine also recognizes that it would be "absurd to require a wronged patient to interrupt corrective efforts by serving a summons on the physician or hospital" (Allende v New York City Health and Hosps. Corp., 90 NY2d 333, 338 [1997], quoting Borgia v City of New York, 12 NY2d 151, 156 [1962]).

Plaintiff argues that all the patient's subsequent visits to nonparty Dr. Dinkin constituted a continuation of her "hospital course of treatment" for her IIH diagnosis. According to Plaintiff's papers, Dr. Dinkin treated her "several times a month for her vision deficits resulting from her IIH from July 2, 2013 through 2024," and he periodically refilled and adjusted her prescriptions. As noted in Plaintiff's expert affirmation, she "saw Dr. Dinkin on a very regular schedule" after the referral, returning once every 1-3 months from August 2013 through March 2016 "and numerous subsequent visits" thereafter. There appears to be no dispute that Plaintiff continues to treat with Dr. Dinkin to the present day.

In substance, Plaintiff's primary argument with respect to the continuous treatment doctrine is that her subsequent treatment by nonparty Dr. Dinkin should be imputed to all NYPH defendants. It is noted that Plaintiff never deposed Dr. Dinkin and did not seek or obtain any further discovery about an alleged employment or agency relationship between Dr. Dinkin and NYPH. Therefore, despite the prior justice's order granting leave to renew the motion after further discovery, Defendants argue that no new discovery has been obtained since the time of that original motion that support Plaintiff's continuous treatment argument or raise any genuine issue of fact.

Notwithstanding the above, Plaintiff argues that an "agency relationship" existed between Dr. Dinkin and the hospital, such that his treatment of Plaintiff should be imputed to the physicians treating her in the emergency department and neurology unit on June 13-15, 2013, thereby making this action timely. The same argument is made as to Dr. Lappin, who saw Plaintiff again on June 27, 2013 in the emergency room.

The continuous treatment doctrine may apply when a patient receives a continuous course of treatment from a medical group, practice, or hospital, linking the earlier dates of treatment of individual providers to the continued treatment of others within that practice or facility (see Darrisaw v Interfaith Med. Ctr., 238 AD3d 1111, 1113 [2d Dept 2025]; Osborn v DeChiara, 165 AD3d 1270, 1272 [2d Dept 2018]; Ozimek v Staten Is. Physicians Practice, P.C., 101 AD3d 833 [2d Dept 2012]). Where a plaintiff demonstrates "she was a patient of the practice" rather than the individual physician, "the continuous treatment [of a later-treating physician] may be imputed to the practice and its employee . . . so as to render the action against [said employee] timely" (Osborn at 1272; see also Mule v Peloro, 60 AD3d 649, 650 [2d Dept 2009]). For example, in a dental malpractice case, the Second Department found triable issues of fact that the treatment of various dentists within the same practice were part of an ongoing course of treatment for the same complaints and symptoms "ultimately traced to abnormal and severe periodontal disease" (Cohen v Gold, 165 AD3d 879, 883 [2d Dept 2018]).

However, "a plaintiff in a medical malpractice action may not avoid the effect of CPLR 214—a by attempting to impute continuous treatment by one physician to another physician based solely upon allegations of a vague and amorphous 'relationship' between the two medical professionals (Cox v Kingsboro Med. Grp., 214 AD2d 150, 151 [2d Dept 1995], affd 88 NY2d 904 [1996]). There must be evidence of "an agency or other relevant relationship" (id. at 154). The providers being "affiliated" with the same hospital, standing alone, is insufficient to establish the requisite relationship (id. at 153-155). The Court of Appeals has also expressly held that a referral from one physician to another specialist or general practitioner, after which there is no further treatment by the defendant, does not give rise to a "continuous treatment" nexus between the physicians (Cox, 88 NY2d at 907).

For the continuous treatment doctrine to apply, the relevant issue is whether Plaintiff would be considered a continuing patient of the facility/hospital.

Here, Plaintiff's claims against the defendants arise entirely from the first emergency department visit from June 13-15, 2013, when she was assessed and treated by each of the named defendants for symptoms which included headaches, blurred vision, and dizziness. She later returned to the emergency department on June 27, 2013 with "worsening photophobia" and headaches. On that second admission to NYPH, she was diagnosed with IIH and prescribed Diamox by a nonparty neurology attending physician. That same physician put her in contact with Dr. Dinkin, a neuro-ophthalmologist who would treat her on an outpatient basis at the "clinic at Weill Cornell Eye Associates  ² . . . for proper visual field testing and other imaging modalities." Her discharge papers on July 2, 2013 included a referral to follow up with Dr. Dinkin on the same date.

Unlike cases where the plaintiff was considered a "patient of the practice" rather than a specific provider, Plaintiff's subsequent treatment records and her own affirmation clearly demonstrate that her continuing doctor/patient relationship was with Dr. Dinkin individually, whom she continued to follow up with directly every 1-3 months for several years, rather than the hospital where she did not return after 2014.

Plaintiff's argument also relies on an alleged ostensible or apparent agency between NYPH and neuro-ophthalmologist Dr. Dinkin, due to the hospital's referral of the patient after her emergency room presentation and neurology admission in June-July 2013. Although there is no evidence disputing the movants' showing that Dr. Dinkin was not employed by NYPH, Plaintiff argues that he was "held out" as an agent because he had his first consultation with the patient during her hospital admission. The patient later saw him at an office "across the street from the hospital" according to her affirmation. Plaintiff also notes that Dr. Dinkin used an office letterhead which included both "Weill Cornell Medical College" and "New York-Presbyterian Hospital Weill Cornell Medical College."

The Court rejects Plaintiff's argument that Dr. Dinkin's non-employee affiliation with NYPH and the patient's referral for outpatient treatment created an "agency or other relevant relationship" for the purpose of continuous treatment. The Court notes that even if Dr. Dinkin was an employee or member of an affiliated hospital or clinic, that status would not automatically create a nexus between the patient's initial emergency room visit and his later neuro-ophthalmology treatment (see Pannell v New York City Health and Hosps. Corp., 192 AD3d 1130, 1131 [2d Dept 2021]). But here, the alleged employee or agent relationship is non-existent.

Plaintiff also relies on the Mduba line of cases, claiming that the defendant NYPH (through another nonparty neurologist) initially referred the patient to Dr. Dinkin as a specialist after she sought treatment from the NYPH emergency room, rather than a private physician of her choosing (see Fuessel v Chin, 179 AD3d 899, 901 [2d Dept 2020]; Mduba v Benedictine Hosp., 52 AD2d 450 [3d Dept 1976]). However, this argument conflates continuous treatment with an ostensible/apparent agency relationship giving rise to vicarious liability, which is not the issue before the Court in this motion. Whether NYPH may have been held vicariously liable for Dr. Dinkin through apparent agency is irrelevant to the issue of whether his subsequent treatment of Plaintiff can be imputed to the NYPH physicians and staff who evaluated her in June 2013. The question before this Court is whether an "agency or other relevant relationship" existed between Dr. Dinkin and the emergency, neurology, and anesthesiology defendants. On that issue, Plaintiff has not presented any evidence raising a triable issue of fact.

Plaintiff also argues that "NYPH's treatment . . . was not completed when the hospital discharged her on July 2, 2013," because Dr. Dinkin "sent plaintiff back to NYPH on February 11, 2014 where she was admitted to neurology due to vision changes." However, a physician's recommendation to go to a hospital for acute/emergent treatment does not demonstrate a broader agency relationship between Dr. Dinkin and the hospital. Courts have consistently held that a mere referral from one provider to another does not represent a continuous course of treatment. In Cox v Kingsboro Med. Group, the underlying facts involved a patient who was referred by a medical group to a surgical specialist. The Second Department noted that the plaintiffs "failed to set forth any evidence to demonstrate that the relationship between [the defendant and subsequent treating medical group] was in any manner different than that between any independent physician who refers a patient to any other independent specialist" (Cox, 214 AD2d at 155). The Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that an ambiguous "consulting relationship" between a medical group and surgical group was not enough to support application of the continuous treatment doctrine. As the Court of Appeals stated, "the most [plaintiffs] have demonstrated is the existence of an unwritten practice" to refer patients from one facility to another for additional testing and treatment, but the plaintiffs did not demonstrate that the patient "explicitly anticipated" any further treatment by the surgical consult when he returned to his referring physician (Cox, 88 NY2d at 907).

The Second Department has similarly held that a referral to a pulmonary specialist did not give rise to the "existence of an agency relationship" between the physicians (Mandel v Herrmann, 271 AD2d 661, 662 [2d Dept 2000]), and that the continuous treatment doctrine did not apply to a physician who "made no treatment recommendations and merely referred the plaintiff's mother to a neurologist" who later treated the patient (Kennedy v Decker, 237 AD2d 576, 577 [2d Dept 1997]). In the latter case, the court held that after the time of the alleged malpractice, "the evaluation and treatment of the plaintiff's neurologic condition . . . became the responsibility of other physicians whose negligence, if any, cannot be imputed to the [defendant physician] for the purposes of applying the continuous treatment doctrine" (id.).

The Court finds that the same referral principles apply here. Plaintiff does not raise a triable issue of fact as to continuous treatment simply because a NYPH neurologist referred her to Dr. Dinkin, an independent specialist, whom she continued to follow for several years, and he recommended she return to the hospital on one occasion. This is insufficient to show the existence of a relevant relationship between Dr. Dinkin and the named defendants, or any ongoing role in her treatment by those defendants.

The seminal cases cited by Plaintiff only further demonstrate that the policy considerations behind the doctrine are contradicted by the facts and circumstances here. Courts have long recognized that "it would be absurd to require a wronged patient to interrupt corrective efforts by serving a summons on the physician or hospital" (Allende v New York City Health and Hosps. Corp., 90 NY2d 333, 338 [1997]). "The purpose of the doctrine is to 'maintain the physician-patient relationship in the belief that the most efficacious medical care will be obtained when the attending physician remains on a case from onset to cure" (Nykorchuck v Henriques, 78 NY2d 255, 258 [1991], quoting McDermott v Torre, 56 NY2d 399, 408 [1982]). In this case, Plaintiff would not be interrupting her treatment with Dr. Dinkin by timely suing NYPH and its physicians within the statute of limitations period. According to her own affirmation and records, she has continued to treat with Dr. Dinkin even after commencement of this lawsuit.

For these reasons, the Court finds Dr. Dinkin's treatment of Plaintiff as a private physician from 2013-2016 and thereafter cannot be imputed to any NYPH defendants under the continuous treatment doctrine.

Turning to Defendant Dr. Straff, Plaintiff separately argues in their opposition that his treatment of Plaintiff on her return to the emergency department on February 11, 2014 represents a continuous course of treatment, and therefore Plaintiff's claims against him are not time-barred.

Plaintiff's claims against Dr. Straff arise from his initial involvement in her emergency department treatment from June 13-15, 2013. Specifically, Dr. Straff cosigned a note as an emergency attending physician on June 14 before Plaintiff was transferred from the emergency department to neurology; she was discharged the following day. Eight months later, on February 14, 2014, Dr. Dinkin referred Plaintiff to NYPH emergency department due to vision changes, and Dr. Straff was the emergency attending physician in the hospital that day. She was then admitted to neurology and discharged later that same day. Plaintiff argues that the subsequent emergency room evaluation on February 11, 2014 extends the statute of limitations to August 11, 2016 based on the continuous treatment doctrine.

As generally discussed above, the three-prong test of the continuous treatment doctrine turns on whether (1) the patient continued to seek and obtained an actual course of treatment, (2) for the same condition and complaints, and (3) the treatment is continuous, i.e., further treatment is explicitly anticipated. The Second Department has held that the "continuing nature of a diagnosis does not itself amount to continuous treatment" (Evans v Ginsberg, 292 AD2d 566, 566 [2d Dept 2002]; see also Almodovar v St. Vincent's Hosp. and Med. Ctr. of New York, 236 AD2d 435, 435-436 [2d Dept 1997]).

"Continuity of treatment is often found to exist when further treatment is explicitly anticipated by both physician and patient as manifested in the form of a regularly scheduled appointment for the near future, agreed upon during the last visit, in conformance with the periodic appointments which characterized the treatment in the immediate past" (Nisanov at 1093 [internal quotation marks and citations omitted]).

In a case involving failure to diagnose a patient's wrist fracture, the Second Department found that at the time of the alleged malpractice "the plaintiff was not aware that he needed to seek further treatment, and was not explicitly anticipating a return to the hospital for follow-up care" (McPherson v Abraham (13 AD3d 422, 424 [2d Dept 2004]). The court therefore held that his return to the emergency department months later, prompted by a new and separate injury to his wrist, did not constitute a continuous course of treatment.

Similarly here, at the time of her first emergency department discharge on June 15, 2013, Plaintiff was not diagnosed with IIH, she had no scheduled follow-up appointment, and there was no expectation that she would return to any NYPH providers. Even assuming that her "timely return visit" to the same emergency department on June 27, 2013 might represent a continuation of care from the first visit on June 13, 2013, she was again discharged with instructions to follow up with another provider, rather than anticipating any return to the hospital or to Dr. Straff individually (c.f. Ramos v Rakhmanchik, 48 AD3d 657, 658 [2d Dept 2008]).

The Court finds that based on the evidence in the record, Plaintiff's additional February 2014 visit to NYPH did not result from an expectation from either party at the time of the June 2013 visit that Plaintiff would continue treating with Dr. Straff. While she may have sought treatment during the two June visits for vision changes, allegedly related to her underlying diagnosis of IIH, there was crucially no anticipation of further treatment by either the physician or patient at the time of the emergency room visits of 2013. In the absence of any anticipation of further treatment with Dr. Straff or the hospital between her initial June 2013 visit and the separate February 2014 evaluation, the Court finds that visit is not a continuation of the alleged negligent treatment rendered in June 2013 and cannot render her claims against Dr. Straff timely.

Further, the courts have held that the continuous treatment doctrine does not apply to "discrete, intermittent medical services" such as provided by a "diagnostician, such as a radiologist . . . unless the diagnostician has a continuing or other relevant relationship with the patient" (Cole v Karanfilian, 117 AD3d 670, 672 [2d Dept 2014]). The Second Department applied the same principle to a gynecologist whose biopsies of the patient were considered "discrete and complete, and not part of a course of treatment" (Nisanov v Khulpateea, 137 AD3d 1091, 1092 [2d Dept 2016])

In this case, despite Plaintiff's ongoing IIH diagnosis, her emergency room presentation in February 2014 represented a discrete rendering of medical services. Dr. Straff was an emergency department attending physician who happened to evaluate her on two separate occasions. Here, the Court finds that the medical care and assessment rendered by Dr. Straff as the emergency department attending physician in February 2014 was discrete from the initial June 2013 visit, with no expectation of a continuing relationship with the patient.

Accordingly, the Court finds Plaintiff has failed to raise an issue of fact, and her claims against all defendants in this action are time-barred by the statute of limitations. As Plaintiff's claims against NYPH are entirely based in vicarious liability for the named physicians, they must also be dismissed as time-barred, as a vicarious liability claim "cannot stand where there is no primary liability upon which such a claim of vicarious liability might rest" (Wijesinghe v Buena Vida Corp., 210 AD3d 824, 826 [2d Dept 2022]).

It is hereby:

ORDERED that Defendants' motion (Seq. No. 4) to renew their motion to dismiss, and upon renewal, to dismiss Plaintiff's Complaint in its entirety as time-barred by the statute of limitations, is GRANTED.

This constitutes the decision and order of the Court.

ENTER.

Hon. Consuelo Mallafre Melendez J.S.C.

FOOTNOTES

1.   Lack of informed consent is "considered as in the realm of a malpractice action" and governed by the same statute of limitations (Murriello v Crapotta, 51 AD2d 381, 384 [2d Dept 1976]; see CPLR 214-a; Public Health Law § 2805-d).

2.   The Court notes that there is no clarification in the record as to any corporate relationship between NYPH and Weill Cornell Eye Associates, but Dr. Dinkin maintained separate medical records from NYPH.

Consuelo Mallafre Melendez, J.