What is the standard of care of a physician?

British Columbia, Canada


The following excerpt is from Agno v. Wilson, 2007 BCSC 1160 (CanLII):

It is conceded that the defendants owed the plaintiffs a duty of care. The question is whether the defendants or either of them breached the duty of care and the analysis begins with the determination of the standard of care. A physician must possess and use that reasonable degree of learning and skill ordinarily possessed by practitioners in similar communities in similar cases. The court must judge the conduct of the physician based on the standard of an ordinary average specialist in the same field. All a physician need do is establish that he or she followed a generally accepted or standard practice and a finding of no negligence is the expected result. A physician is not required to meet a standard of perfection (ter Neuzen v. Korn (1995), 1995 CanLII 72 (SCC), 11 B.C.L.R. (3d) 201 (S.C.C.) paras. 33 and 34).

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