Case information

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Case summaries are prepared by the Office of the Registrar of the Supreme Court of Canada (Law Branch). Please note that summaries are not provided to the Judges of the Court. They are placed on the Court file and website for information purposes only.

Torts – Negligence – Medical malpractice – Summary judgment – Limitation periods – Whether courts below erred in granting summary judgment and dismissing claim on basis that it was statute barred, and in holding absence of expert medical evidence in support of plaintiff’s claim is fatal to medical malpractice claim in all but the clearest of cases.

Songyuan Liu sustained a serious knee injury in a motor vehicle accident in 2011. He had surgery to repair the knee involving the insertion of 19 staples. Approximately two weeks after the surgery, the staples were removed by his then family doctor, Dr. Wong. About a year later, Mr. Liu was assessed by a different doctor at the behest of the lawyer representing him in his tort claim arising out of the accident. That doctor’s assessment concluded that Mr. Liu’s knee was permanently injured and would not return to normal. The doctor was not asked to, and did not provide an opinion with respect to any injury that may have arisen as a result of the removal of the staples by Dr. Wong. On October 9, 2014 – more than three years after the removal of the staples and a follow up appointment with another doctor – Mr. Liu commenced an action for negligence against Dr. Wong, asserting that Dr. Wong did a poor job of removing the staples, breaking one of them in the process, causing him to suffer great pain and bleeding, and resulting in his knee becoming permanently injured.

Dr. Wong’s motion for summary judgment was granted by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, and Mr. Liu’s medical malpractice action against Dr. Wong was dismissed on the basis that: the action was statute barred by a 2-year limitation period provided for in the Limitations Act, 2002, S.O. 2002, c.24, Sched. B, s.4; and this was not one of “the clearest of cases” in which no expert’s report is required to support the plaintiff’s malpractice allegations. The Ontario Court of Appeal unanimously dismissed Mr. Liu’s appeal.