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Anderson v. Alabama Reference Laboratories8/18/2000
The plantiffs, Thomas Mark Anderson and his wife Cynthia S. Anderson, appeal from a summary judgment in favor of the defendant Alabama Reference Laboratories ("ARL"). We affirm.
I.
On September 13, 1995, Thomas Mark Anderson went to his physician, Dr. Keith Fuller, a family practitioner, complaining of various symptoms, including coughing up yellow-greenish sputum. Dr. Fuller diagnosed pneumonia and treated Anderson with antibiotics. He instructed Anderson to return on September 22. Anderson, however, returned two days later, on September 15, complaining of fatigue and high fever. Dr. Fuller again diagnosed pneumonia. As part of his treatment, Dr. Fuller collected a sputum specimen and sent it to ARL for testing. ARL tested the specimen, and the results were normal. ARL reported the results to Dr. Fuller. Anderson saw Dr. Fuller again on September 18 and 22. After the fourth visit, Anderson believed he had recovered from the pneumonia; he did not return to Dr. Fuller for any further treatment.
On November 5, Dr. Fuller received another report from ARL concerning the results from the testing of Anderson's sputum specimen.
That report stated that Anderson's sputum specimen was presumptively positive for tuberculosis. Dr. Fuller contacted Anderson's wife and asked that she and Anderson come to his office. They did. Dr. Fuller told Anderson that he had tuberculosis and prescribed various drugs to treat the disease. Dr. Fuller also told Anderson to report his disease to the local county health department. Dr. Fuller told Anderson, in the presence of Anderson's wife, who was then seven-months pregnant with the couple's first child, that persons with tuberculosis may also be infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), and he recommended that Anderson submit to an HIV test. Dr. Fuller instructed Anderson that, because tuberculosis is a highly communicable disease, he should tell any persons with whom he had close, daily contact that they should be tested for tuberculosis.
After his meeting with Dr. Fuller, Anderson reported to the local county health department, where he was required to sign a form promising to take the drugs for treatment of tuberculosis for one year. Anderson began taking the drugs. As a result of taking the drugs for tuberculosis, he suffered several side effects, including a rash, dizziness, fatigue, nausea, and repeated vomiting.
On November 21, Dr. Fuller received another reported from ARL. That report stated that Anderson's sputum specimen tested positive for tuberculosis and that ARL's finding of tuberculosis had been confirmed by the Alabama Department of Health State Laboratory. Dr. Fuller regarded this report as definitive proof that Anderson had tuberculosis.
Approximately six weeks after he had initially diagnosed Anderson with tuberculosis, Dr. Fuller received a telephone call from either ARL or the State Health Department (Dr. Fuller said he does not recall which) and by that call was informed that DNA testing had been performed on Anderson's sputum sample. The DNA testing was performed by a microbiologist with the University of Alabama at Birmingham, as part of a state-sponsored study to determine the patterns of infection through Alabama. As a result of the DNA testing, it was discovered that Anderson's sputum specimen had been contaminated with another donor's specimen and that the tuberculosis bacterium in his specimen had come from that other person. Dr. Fuller then informed Anderson that the results of the test had been incorrect and that he did not have tuberculosis.
On October 7, 1997, Anderson and his wife filed this action against ARL in the Russell Circuit Court.
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