Pittman v. Upjohn Co.
890 S.W.2d 425, 1994 Tenn. LEXIS 337 (1994)
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Rule of Law:
A drug manufacturer, prescribing physician, or dispensing pharmacist's duty to warn about the dangers of a prescription drug does not extend to an adult third party who, without knowledge or permission, ingests a drug prescribed for someone else, because such misuse is not a reasonably foreseeable probability.
Facts:
- Dr. Ralph W. Simonton diagnosed Bessie Richards with adult-onset diabetes and prescribed Micronase, a drug manufactured by The Upjohn Company.
- Portland Prescription Shop filled the prescription, and at Richards' request, dispensed the tablets in a bottle without a childproof safety cap.
- The only warning on the bottle was to keep all medicine out of the reach of children; no other information about the drug's dangers was provided to Richards by the physician or pharmacist.
- Richards kept the Micronase bottle on top of her refrigerator alongside a bottle of aspirin.
- Donald Wade Pittman, Jr., Richards' 26-year-old grandson, was visiting her and, feeling ill, told Richards he thought he had the flu.
- Richards informed Pittman that there was aspirin on top of the refrigerator.
- Without Richards' knowledge or consent, Pittman took several Micronase tablets from the bottle, apparently mistaking them for aspirin.
- As a result of ingesting the Micronase, Pittman suffered severe hypoglycemia, leading to permanent brain damage.
Procedural Posture:
- The plaintiffs, as guardians for Donald Wade Pittman, Jr., filed a lawsuit in a Tennessee trial court against The Upjohn Company, Dr. Ralph W. Simonton, Jr., and Portland Prescription Shop.
- The trial court granted summary judgment in favor of The Upjohn Company and Portland Prescription Shop.
- The trial court denied Dr. Simonton's motion for summary judgment.
- The parties appealed to the Tennessee Court of Appeals.
- The Court of Appeals affirmed summary judgment for The Upjohn Company and Portland Prescription Shop, and it reversed the trial court's decision regarding Dr. Simonton, granting him summary judgment.
- The plaintiffs appealed the Court of Appeals' decision to the Supreme Court of Tennessee.
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Issue:
Does the duty of a prescription drug manufacturer, a prescribing physician, or a dispensing pharmacist to warn of a drug's dangers extend to an adult third party who ingests the drug after taking it without the patient's knowledge or consent?
Opinions:
Majority - Reid, Justice.
No. The duty to warn owed by a drug manufacturer, physician, or pharmacist does not extend to an unforeseeable third party who misuses the medication. The court reasoned separately for each defendant. For the manufacturer, The Upjohn Company, the 'learned intermediary doctrine' applies. The manufacturer discharged its duty by providing adequate warnings about the drug's risks, including hypoglycemia, to the prescribing physician and pharmacist, who are expected to use their professional judgment to inform the patient. For the physician, Dr. Simonton, while a duty of care can extend to foreseeable non-patients, the harm to Pittman was not a reasonably foreseeable probability. Unlike cases involving contagious diseases, the danger from the drug was benign until Pittman actively took it; the court found it unforeseeable that an adult guest would take another's prescription medication without permission. Similarly, for the pharmacy, Portland Prescription Shop, any duty to warn is also limited by foreseeability, and since the harm was not foreseeable for the physician, it was likewise not foreseeable for the pharmacist.
Analysis:
This case clarifies the limits of the duty to warn in the context of prescription drugs, establishing a strong foreseeability threshold for liability. By classifying the non-prescribed ingestion by an adult as an unforeseeable 'remote possibility,' the decision protects manufacturers, physicians, and pharmacists from liability for highly unusual misuse by third parties. The ruling reinforces the 'learned intermediary doctrine' for manufacturers while simultaneously confirming that the duties of physicians and pharmacists, though potentially extending to non-patients, are ultimately circumscribed by what is reasonably and probably foreseeable, not by what is merely possible.
