The evolution of the corporate practice of medicine has increased the scope of vicarious liability on the part of hospital systems, particularly in the area of emergency medicine. As corporate entities directly employ more of the professionals treating patients in their emergency rooms, and market their emergency services to the public, New York has recognized liability on the part of institutional healthcare providers for negligent emergency care even when the emergency room provider is not employed by the defendant hospital. Mduba v. Benedictine Hosp., 52 A.D.2d 450 (3d Dep't 1976), Hill v. St. Clare's Hosp., 67 N.Y.2d 72 (1986). The increasing scope of liability for the institution has created some confusion as to the liability of the individual emergency room physician, who has frequently rendered discrete services at the outset of a long and complicated course of treatment. This article addresses how the legal duty of the emergency room physician remains a question of law across a spectrum of treatment scenarios. Those providers continue to require careful attention from their counsel to limit their involvement and exposure to the circumstances in which the law has determined that they owe a duty to the patient.