Whether a psychiatric hospital's incident report, arising from the alleged sexual abuse by a hospital employee of a patient, is subject to disclosure pursuant to a discovery request.

No. A psychiatric hospital's incident report containing allegations of sexual abuse by hospital employee of a patient is exempt from disclosure under Education Law § 6527(3) and Mental Hygiene Law § 29.29 since it clearly contemplates a quality assurance function.

Claimant sought to discover all incident reports arising from the alleged sexual assault by a hospital employee of her infant daughter while she was a patient at the defendant psychiatric hospital. The entire file consisted of two incident reports, an investigation report and a safety department report. Defendant refused to disclose the file, claiming that it was exempt from disclosure under Education Law § 6527(3).

Education Law § 6527 exempts records relating to medical review or quality assurance functions, records demonstrating participation in a medical and dental malpractice prevention program, and reports required by the Department of Health pursuant to Public Health Law § 2805-l, including incident reports prepared pursuant to Mental Hygiene Law § 29.29, from disclosure under N.Y. C.P.L.R. 31. Under Mental Hygiene Law § 29.29, incident reports include any allegations of violent behavior exhibited by either patients or employees.

The Court of Claims, after conducting an in camera review, ordered disclosure of the file, asserting that it did not relate to a quality-of-care or medical function review under § 6527(3), but rather, that it was part of a security function. The Appellate Division reversed, claiming that, Education Law § 6527(3) and Mental Hygiene Law § 29.29, when read in tandem, prohibited disclosure of the defendant's incident reports. It also certified the question to the Court of Appeals as to whether its order was proper.

The Court of Appeals held that the order of the Appellate Division was indeed proper and affirmed their decision prohibiting disclosure. The Court found that the language of Education Law § 6527(3) was unequivocal. Furthermore, when read in conjunction with Mental Hygiene Law § 29.29, the statute indicates that a report containing allegations of sexual abuse by a hospital employee falls squarely within the category of reports that allege violent behavior by a hospital employee, and thus was barred from disclosure.

The Court rejected claimant's arguments that § 6527(3) should be limited to reports relating to a medical review and quality assurance, and directly deal with the medical care and treatment of a patient and therefore that the report should be disclosed since sexual abuse is a non-medical incident. Again, noting the plain language of the statutes, and additionally the legislative history, the Court held that quality of care should not be read to exclude reports of patient abuse. Furthermore, the Court noted that this holding is consistent with the purpose of § 6527(3) which is to encourage improved quality of care through self-review while protecting from legal redress. The Court further noted that investigations, such as the one at issue, clearly reflect a quality assurance review since the procedures outlines in Mental Hygiene Law § 29.29 provide for a patient care and safety team to investigate and report on any incidents of violent behavior exhibited by a hospital employee. This scheme of review strongly supports a quality assurance function and the reports generated as part of that function are therefore exempt from disclosure.