Based on the health care providers’ failure to preserve their objections to the plaintiffs’ supplemental expert report, the Fort Worth Court of Appeals has had no choice but to affirm a trial court order denying the providers’ motion to dismiss Plaintiffs’ wrongful death lawsuit.
Sagora Senior Living, Inc., WTCG Granbury Campus, LLC d/b/a Waterview – The Cove, and Waterview the Cove Assisted Living and Memory Care v. Andrea Wood and Jamie Jackson (No. 02-25-00150-CV; September 11, 2025) arose from the death of a resident of an assisted living facility from aspiration pneumonia and alcohol intoxication. Plaintiffs sued several Defendants for negligence and wrongful death. Plaintiff served an expert report of a physician opining that the facility failed to keep and provide adequate records, failed to adequately supervise the decedent, and failed to prevent her alcoholic intoxication. Defendants objected and moved to dismiss Plaintiffs’ claims, arguing that the expert was not qualified to render an opinion regarding the standard of care, that he failed to articulate the standard of care and how Defendants breached the standard, and his opinions regarding causation were speculative and conclusory. The trial court granted Plaintiffs 30 days to cure the report, which they did. After Defendants once more objected, the trial court held a hearing and denied their motions to dismiss. Defendants appealed.
In an opinion by Justice Wallach, the court of appeals affirmed. First, the court determined that Plaintiffs’ expert, a board-certified physician currently practicing internal medicine, rheumatology, and geriatrics with experience treating patients in long-term care facilities (including Alzheimer’s patients), had the necessary qualifications to render an opinion as to the standard of care applicable to assisted-living facilities. Second, the court ruled that Defendants failed to preserve for review their arguments that the expert’s supplemental report was deficient because it didn’t articulate a standard of care, explain how Defendants breached the standard, or establish a causal connection between their alleged conduct and decedent’s death. Though Defendants made these objections to the expert’s original report, they did not reassert them with regard to the supplemental report. The court thus affirmed the trial court’s order.
