Ronald Perry sued emergency room pediatrician Shalini Gilotra-Mallik and her practice, Pediatric Emergency Associates, P.C. “Mallik”, for the wrongful death of his seven-month-old daughter. After hearing the evidence, the jury returned a defense verdict, and Perry appeals, contending that the trial court erred in denying his request to treat some of his witnesses as hostile, in restricting his re-cross-examination of Mallik, in denying a request to charge, and in denying his motion in limine seeking to exclude the testimony of two expert defense witnesses. For the reasons that follow, we affirm. The parties do not dispute the underlying facts. The Perrys took their daughter Gabrielle to the emergency room because she had a high fever and their pediatrician’s office was about to close. The child was triaged and her condition was assessed as urgent because of her elevated temperature, respirations, and pulse rate. Dr. Mallik examined the child, ordered the administration of tests and medicine, and after three hours, discharged her under the mistaken impression that the child’s temperature had fallen. In fact, the child’s temperature had remained elevated, a fact that a nurse had entered into the hospital’s electronic records system. At home less than an hour later, the child stopped breathing and subsequently died at the hospital.
Perry initially sued the hospital and Mallik in DeKalb County, but the case was transferred to Fulton County.1 Perry dismissed his case against the hospital without prejudice.2 Mallik was thus the only defendant in this case. The parties agreed in their pretrial order that the jury issues were whether Mallik breached the applicable standard of care in her treatment of the child; if so, whether that breach proximately caused her death; and if it did, how much would the jury award in damages. Perry contended specifically that Mallik violated the standard of care by discharging the child while she was in an unstable condition, “under the erroneous impression that both her temperature and her respiratory rate were significantly lower than they actually were.” At trial, in addition to a number of fact witnesses, an expert witness testified for Perry that Mallik had violated the standard of care, and two expert witnesses testified for Mallik that she had not. After five days of trial, the jury returned a defense verdict.
