Schloendorff v. Society of New York Hospital

Mary Schloendorff entered New York Hospital in January 1908 with a stomach disorder. She agreed to an examination under ether to learn the nature of a tumor, but she refused, by her account, to have any operation. While she was unconscious, surgeons removed the tumor, a fibroid. Gangrene followed, and some of her fingers had to be amputated.

She sued the hospital. On 14 April 1914 the New York Court of Appeals, in an opinion by Judge Benjamin Cardozo, ruled against her. The court held that the relation between a hospital and its physicians is not that of master and servant, so the hospital could not be held liable for what the surgeons had done, and the judgment for the hospital was affirmed.

On the way to that result Cardozo set down the principle the case is remembered for. Every adult of sound mind, he wrote, has the right to decide what shall be done with his own body, and a surgeon who operates without the patient's consent commits an assault and is liable in damages. He allowed one exception: an emergency in which the patient is unconscious and an operation is needed before consent can be obtained.

The sentence outlived the ruling. Paul Lombardo of Georgia State University College of Law describes it as a touchstone for discussions of informed consent. Lombardo also argues that the case is better read as an early malpractice dispute, in which hospital officials denied liability whatever the facts turned out to be.