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Monaco v. Healthpartners of Southern Arizona6/29/1999
e Ball v. Prentice, 162 Ariz. 150, 781 P.2d 628 (App. 1989) (plaintiff entitled to have jury decide whether nausea, loss of sleep, headaches, and emotional problems causally connected to automobile accident); Quinn (three-year-old boy's post-accident behavioral changes requiring treatment by psychologist for anxiety and by dentist for teeth grinding sufficient to defeat summary judgment). Moreover, Keck itself involved only severe emotional and physical distress, and Burns, relying on comment c to § 436A, determined that the "headaches, acid indigestion, weeping, muscle spasms, depression and insomnia" some of the plaintiffs had suffered were "transitory physical phenomena" and, thus,"not the type of bodily harm which would sustain a cause of action for emotional distress." Burns, 156 Ariz. at 379, 752 P.2d at 32. In sum, the Arizona cases and Restatement § 436A make clear that a physical injury, as well as a long-term physical illness or mental disturbance, constitutes sufficient bodily harm to support a claim of negligent infliction of emotional distress.
In this case, James Monaco testified that, since the P32 treatment, he believes "I am going to come down with [leukemia]" and even though " eople say to me, just get it out of your head[, i]t does not work that way." He stated he has trouble sleeping, dreams frequently "about coming down with leukemia," and often walks "around the house from sometimes 2:00 in the morning till the sun comes up." He added that he does not have patience with his adult children and does not enjoy long visits by his grandchildren. Monaco also testified he had received counseling from Dr. Schwebel for his anger at Dr. Ramanna and was undergoing counseling with Dr. Crago for his anxiety.
Theresa Monaco corroborated her husband's testimony, stating:
At night he is a wreck. He jumps all over the bed. I don't know what makes him do it. And on occasion I will go and hold him and say, maybe if I hold him, he won't jump like this. But after getting kicked and batted two or three times, I move over to my own side of the bed. And you wake up in the night and he's not there, he's walking around the house. Or you wake up and he's in the bed, soaking all like that. Grinds his teeth.
Dr. Crago, a psychologist, gave uncontradicted testimony that, after treating Monaco's anxiety for about six months, he had diagnosed the condition as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Dr. Crago stated that PTSD is "a widely accepted diagnosis" and described it as follows:
" he defining characteristic [of PTSD] is something happens that is perceived as very threatening or life threatening, something traumatic. Something that makes you feel vulnerable or was very scary.
Then what follows clinically, . . . people start having intrusive thoughts about this [trauma]. They cannot get it out of their mind. Usually the first thing they are aware of is they may have nightmares . . . or wake up in a sweat at night. They are just not sleeping well. . . .
Other things that are very common are just a general sense of anxiety, maybe hypervigilant. . . . heir nerves are frayed a bit. . . . hey tend to withdraw. They are not themselves and so they maybe avoid their friends or family, become a little bit isolated. They may show symptoms of depression."
Dr. Crago testified that Monaco exhibited many of these same symptoms: " e had intrusive thoughts, he had nightmares, wasn't sleeping well. He had depressive syndrome, wasn't doing well in the social life. He wasn't the same person with his family." Dr. Crago believed Monaco could learn to control his PTSD, but he would never "be cured of it." Finally, Dr. Crago stated t
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