Informed consent is a separate ground of liability in Ontario medical malpractice law, distinct from negligent treatment. A physician who performs a procedure without obtaining the patient’s consent at all may be liable in battery. A physician who obtains consent but fails to disclose the material risks and alternatives to a proposed treatment may be liable in negligence for any resulting harm.
The leading Canadian authority is Reibl v Hughes, [1980] 2 SCR 880, which established a modified objective test for causation in informed consent cases: would a reasonable person in the plaintiff’s particular circumstances have refused the treatment had the risks been properly disclosed? Hopp v Lepp, [1980] 2 SCR 192, set out the scope of the physician’s disclosure obligation.
Informed consent cases turn on the materiality of the undisclosed risk, the quality of the consent discussion, the adequacy of the documentation, and the credibility of the patient’s evidence about what they would have done with full information.
Posts tagged Informed Consent analyze how Ontario courts have applied the Reibl framework in surgical, obstetrical, and procedural fact patterns, including cases on the scope of disclosure and on the modified objective test for causation.
The Supreme Court of British Columbia dismisses a maxillomandibular advancement claim brought by a self-represented plaintiff. An American expert who could not identify the Royal College of Dentists of Canada, a seven-hour video log that contradicted the plaintiff’s trial evidence, and an adverse inference the court declined to draw.
A self-represented plaintiff recovered the full $50,000 Small Claims Court limit for burns and permanent pigmentation loss from a laser hair removal treatment, without an expert report on the standard of care. The Court reached that result by applying Ayana v Skin Klinic, the 2009 decision establishing that laser hair removal is not a medical procedure in Ontario. The defence bet that no plaintiff expert meant no case, and lost.
A new review in Laws argues that medical schools are not teaching enough law, and that the gap is making patients less safe. The article is European and persuasive only in Ontario, where CanMEDS, the CPSO and the CMPA already supply most of the framework it recommends. The place the diagnosis actually lands is artificial intelligence.
A physician’s practice was found deficient across assessment, consent, prescribing, monitoring, record keeping and OHIP billing, on the evidence of two complainants and 34 further charts reviewed by two independent assessors. Patients were also asked to sign a form promising not to sue him and not to complain to the College. A look at what the Tribunal did with that, and why a discipline finding is not compensation.
Norman Clarey nearly died after a bowel resection led to a failed anastomosis and a permanent stoma. A Prince Edward Island court nonetheless dismissed his negligence, breach of contract, and informed consent claims, finding Dr. Gillis met the standard of care throughout and that causation was not proven. As an out-of-province decision it is persuasive but not binding in Ontario, though it applies largely Ontario and Supreme Court of Canada authority.
The Court of Appeal dismisses the appeal in Brown v Meaney, upholding findings that two pediatric neurologists breached the standard of care and the duty to obtain informed consent when they abandoned a pyridoxine trial in an infant with a rare epilepsy. The decision affirms that a defensible first impression does not excuse the failure to revisit it, and that causation need not be proven with scientific precision.
A cosmetic surgery clinic recorded patients in consultation rooms and the operating room without telling them. In J.C. v Jugenburg, 2026 ONSC 3061, the court awarded $21.5 million in aggregate damages and $1 million in punitive damages, and clarified how intrusion upon seclusion applies inside the doctor-patient relationship.
Doctors warn against an overwhelming surge of online menopause misinformation. The legal framework where patient harm crosses into medical malpractice in Ontario.
The Supreme Court of British Columbia dismisses a prophylactic laparoscopic hysterectomy bowel injury claim where the plaintiff led no expert evidence. Informed consent, the modified objective test, and the indispensability of expert evidence.
Ontario discipline tribunal imposes four-month suspension, practice restrictions, and mandatory supervision on chronic pain physician with pattern of prior concerns.
The Ontario Physicians and Surgeons Discipline Tribunal revoked Dr. Maharaj’s licence after finding his care of 17 patients fell below the standard of practice and that he was incompetent. A look at the consent, evidence-based-treatment and privacy findings, and what a discipline decision does and does not mean for an injured patient.
New Brunswick court holds anesthesiologist negligent in death of 36-year-old patient with severe obesity and sepsis after spinal anesthesia choice and management.
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