TRIAL COURT DID NOT DEPART FROM ESSENTIAL REQUIREMENTS OF LAW BY ALLOWING DEFENDANT TO ISSUE SUBPOENAS TO NON-PARTY HEALTH CARE PROVIDERS SEEKING PLAINTIFF’S MEDICAL RECORDS – REQUEST THAT THE PRODUCTION BE LIMITED TO 10 YEARS BEFORE THE ACCIDENT WAS PROPERLY REJECTED WHERE PLAINTIFF ADMITTED THAT SHE HAD BEEN DISABLED FROM A BACK INJURY FOR NEARLY 40 YEARS

Valyou v. Navedo, 50 Fla. L. Weekly D685 (Fla. 2nd DCA Mar. 21, 2025):

The plaintiff sued the defendant for injuries sustained in an automobile accident. The defendant served two notices under Rule 1.351, demonstrating the intent to subpoena several non-parties for various records, including medical records for a chiropractor, hospital and dentist.

The plaintiff objected to the issuance of those subpoenas, asserting that the production would violate her privacy rights. Plaintiff requested the trial court either limit the breadth and scope of the subpoenas to documents that related to her neck and back or in the alternative conduct an in-camera review. After a hearing, the trial court overruled the plaintiff’s objections.

The plaintiff argued in her petition that the subpoenas were too broad because they had no temporal limitation, no limitation in scope, no limitation indicating that they were for a one-time use, and that they stated on their face that they would disseminate the plaintiff’s date of birth (the plaintiff did not raise the one-time use or date of birth arguments to the lower court, so they were not considered as part of the writ).

The argument regarding restricting these records for a 10-year period was overruled because the plaintiff conceded she had been disabled from a back injury since 1987. The plaintiff argued against production of her dental records based on the fact she wasn’t making any claim regarding anything dental.

The court concluded that the plaintiff’s claims for bodily injury damages allowed for the production of the requested records and found there was not support to limit the records to her generalized claims for neck and back damages.

As a final matter, the plaintiff never requested or expressed a need for an in-camera review of the records until after the objections were denied. The court found that the trial judge properly denied the plaintiff’s belated and non-specific demand following her complete failure to establish that it was highly probable that the subpoena’s issuance would result in the production of irrelevant records. The moral of the story is to request the in-camera inspection at the outset.