Civilinės atsakomybės už netinkamą asmens sveikatos priežiūros paslaugų teikimą taikymo Lietuvoje ir Italijoje ypatumai.

Abstract

The article primarily deals with civilliability of health care practitioners. Liability arises from professional activities of health care practitioners who cause damage to a life or psychophysical integrity of a person. Therefore the victim can claim compensation for any injury incurred either from the responsible health care institution or directly from health care practitioner. The aim of the article is to take a comparative approach in order to identify and analyse theoretical and practical peculiarities arising from the application of two types of civil liability: contractual and delictual in the field of health care. Italian and Lithuanian legal orders are compared. The main reason to compare them is that Lithuanian Civil Code is among the modem ones in the world (2000) which includes few specific, including liability, provisions regarding health care services, whereas Italian Civil Code (1942) represents a traditional version of civil codes and therefore the evolution of the doctrine on civil liability in the field of health care grosso mod o is influenced by crea¬tive activities of courts. Since Italian and Lithuanian law belongs to the legal tradition of civil law, there are more similarities than differences between them. The same could be said about civil liability in health care. Unlawful deterioration of a person’s health due to performance of obligation can inflict different and potentially competing types of liability: contractual liability, and delictual or extra-contractual liability that arises from torto Court practice of the respective countries seems to follow different paths re¬garding the application of civil liability. Italian courts and legal doctrine tend to interpret liability of health care practitioners as contractual and therefore establish a lO-year statute of limitations, during which obligations are legally enforceable, even in case of a so called "social contact" (when a contract between individual and health care practitioner is presumed). Lithuanian case law considers liability of public health care institution as delictual. However, in terms of the statute of limitations there is no difference between delictual and civilliability since the Civil Code (Art 1.125 comma 8) provides for a 3-year statute of limitations for both types of claims.