California Supreme Court Watch

#24-153 Holland v. Silverscreen Healthcare, Inc., S285429. (B323237; 101 Cal.App.5th 1125; Los Angeles County Superior Court; 22STCV01945.) Petition for review after the Court of Appeal reversed an order denying a motion to compel arbitration in a civil action. This case presents the following issue: In a lawsuit against a skilled nursing facility arising from the facility’s alleged failure to protect a decedent from falls and infection, can the facility rely on an arbitration agreement signed only by the decedent to compel the decedent’s heirs to arbitrate a wrongful death claim?

Petition for review granted: 8/21/2024

Case fully briefed: 11/13/2024

Cause argued and submitted: 5/21/2025

Opinion filed: Judgment reversed: 8/14/2025

See the Court of Appeal Opinion.

See the Petition for Review.

See the Oral Argument.

See the California Supreme Court Opinion.  (Holland v. Silverscreen Healthcare, Inc. (2025) 18 Cal.5th 364.)

“As a general rule, plaintiffs cannot be compelled to arbitrate their disputes if they have not previously agreed to arbitration. But in Ruiz v. Podolsky (2010) 50 Cal.4th 838 (Ruiz), this court identified an exception for certain wrongful death claims based on medical malpractice. If a patient agreed to arbitrate medical malpractice disputes in compliance with the arbitration provision of the Medical Injury Compensation Reform Act (MICRA) (codified as Code Civ. Proc., § 1295), the patient-provider agreement may bind the patient’s heirs in a wrongful death action, even if the heirs themselves never agreed to arbitration. (Ruiz, at pp. 849–850.)

The question before us concerns the application of Ruiz in a recurring context. Plaintiffs sued a 24-hour skilled nursing facility, alleging that the facility’s neglect caused their son’s death. Before his death, plaintiffs’ son had signed an agreement to arbitrate medical malpractice disputes against the facility. Parting company with appellate courts that had taken different approaches to the issue, the Court of Appeal held that the patient-provider agreement binds plaintiffs because their wrongful death claim based on the nursing facility’s neglect is necessarily a claim about the manner in which a health care provider rendered its professional services.

We conclude that the Court of Appeal’s decision in this case extends Ruiz past statutory bounds. Ruiz does not apply to every type of wrongful death claim that might be brought against a health care provider — particularly a provider that, like the skilled nursing facility in this case, provides both medical care and day-to-day custodial care of dependent adults. Under Ruiz, plaintiffs’ claim must be submitted to arbitration only if they are raising a dispute about medical malpractice as that term is defined in MICRA’s arbitration provision — that is, a dispute ‘”as to whether any medical services . . . were improperly, negligently or incompetently rendered.”‘ (Code Civ. Proc., § 1295, subd. (a) (§ 1295(a)).) Ruiz does not require plaintiffs to arbitrate their disputes about a facility’s neglect of a resident’s basic welfare and safety needs.

To the extent the plaintiffs’ complaint in this case fails to detail whether they are alleging deficiencies in the nursing facility’s rendering of medical services or instead in its provision of custodial care, we conclude that they should be permitted to amend their complaint to specify. We reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal and remand for further proceedings.”

Justice Kruger authored the opinion of the Court, in which Chief Justice Guerrero and Justices Corrigan, Liu, Groban, Jenkins, and Evans concurred.

In the news: Miller, California Supreme Court Narrows Reach of Nursing Home Arbitration Agreements, The Recorder (Aug. 14, 2025).