- Court
- Court of Appeals of Georgia
- Year
- 2025
- Case
- Hall v. Umpierrez-Morley
- Citation
- 377 Ga. App. 336
- Decided
- October 22, 2025
A physician's graphic description of a stillborn delivery did not amount to extreme and outrageous conduct as a matter of law. Negligent infliction of emotional distress was also barred because the alleged tortious act was the verbal disclosure, which involved no physical impact.
Summary
The Court of Appeals of Georgia affirmed summary judgment in Hall v. Umpierrez-Morley. The plaintiffs sued their obstetrician for intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress after the physician used graphic language to describe the delivery of their stillborn child.
The appellate court held that the physician’s words were not “extreme and outrageous” as a matter of law and that the negligent-infliction claim was barred by Georgia’s physical-impact rule.
Issues Decided
Intentional infliction of emotional distress
Decision
The court held that the physician’s description of the delivery did not meet the high standard for intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Facts
The plaintiffs were told that a five-month pregnancy was nonviable and elected induced labor. They repeatedly told the physician and hospital staff that they did not want to see the stillborn child. During the breech delivery, the child’s head was severed because of fetal fragility. Neither parent saw the body. Shortly afterward, the physician used graphic language to describe what had happened during delivery.
Reasoning
The court acknowledged the parents’ susceptibility to distress and the physician-patient relationship. Even so, it held that the words used did not satisfy Georgia’s stringent requirement that the conduct be atrocious or utterly intolerable in a civilized community. At most, the court treated the wording as insensitive or negligent, which is not enough for an intentional-infliction claim.
Negligent infliction of emotional distress
Decision
The court held that Georgia’s impact rule barred the negligent-infliction claim.
Facts
The plaintiffs alleged that the physician’s description caused emotional distress. Although the mother had undergone a medically induced delivery, the court identified the allegedly tortious act as the post-delivery verbal description.
Reasoning
Georgia’s impact rule requires a physical impact that causes physical injury, which then causes emotional distress. The verbal disclosure involved no physical impact on either parent. The court declined to create a new exception and expressed concern about chilling necessary physician-patient communication about distressing medical facts.
Commentary
The opinion turns on how the court framed the negligent act. The mother did experience medical treatment, but the court isolated the claimed negligence as the later verbal disclosure. Once framed that way, the impact rule controlled because words alone caused no physical impact.
That framing is important for future emotional-distress claims in medical settings. Plaintiffs who rely on negligent infliction must tie the emotional injury to a physical impact that is part of the tortious conduct itself, not merely to surrounding medical treatment.
