On November 14, 2002, The New Hampshire Supreme Court ruled in Exeter Hospital Medical Staff v. Board of Trustees of Exeter Health Resources, Inc., that a hospital’s medical staff lacks the capacity to sue or be sued. In this case, the hospital’s medical staff brought suit against the hospital after the hospital’s Board of Trustees had removed the president of the medical staff from the Board of Trustees. The trial court granted the hospital’s motion to dismiss the medical staff’s case, ruling that the medical staff lacked capacity to sue or be sued. In affirming the decision of the trial court, the New Hampshire Supreme Court noted that "the medical staff has no legal life of its own and is merely one component of the hospital corporation."
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