Opinion
12296 Index No. 20820/13E Case No. 2020-01599
01-07-2021
XIU F. WANG, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. Cara S. LEVY et al., Defendants–Respondents, Felix Delgado et al., Defendants.
Law Offices of Gary S. Park, P.C., Flushing (Xue Chang of counsel), for appellant. Havkins Rosenfeld & Ritzert, LLP, Mineola (Gail L. Ritzert of counsel), for respondents.
Law Offices of Gary S. Park, P.C., Flushing (Xue Chang of counsel), for appellant.
Havkins Rosenfeld & Ritzert, LLP, Mineola (Gail L. Ritzert of counsel), for respondents.
Manzanet–Daniels, J.P., Kapnick, Mazzarelli, Moulton, JJ.
Order, Supreme Court, Bronx County (Mary Ann Brigantti, J.), entered on or about August 6, 2019, which, to the extent appealed from as limited by the briefs, granted defendants Cara S. Levy and The Institutes of Applied Human Dynamics Inc.'s (hereinafter, defendants) motion for summary judgment dismissing the claim of serious injury to the lumbar spine within the meaning of Insurance Law § 5102(d), unanimously affirmed, without costs.
Defendants established prima facie that plaintiff did not suffer a serious injury to his lumbar spine by submitting plaintiff's MRI report of his lumbar spine and the report of their orthopedic surgeon, who opined that the conditions identified in the MRI report, including osteophytes, were indicative of chronic multilevel disc disease, which preexisted the subject motor vehicle accident (see Sosa–Sanchez v. Reyes, 162 A.D.3d 414, 75 N.Y.S.3d 27 [1st Dept. 2018] ; Khanfour v. Nayem, 148 A.D.3d 426, 49 N.Y.S.3d 394 [1st Dept. 2017] ).
In opposition, plaintiff failed to raise an issue of fact as to causation, as none of his physicians adequately addressed the evidence of preexisting conditions in his own medical records or explained why the preexisting conditions could not have been the cause of his current complaint (see Monahan v. Reyes, 184 A.D.3d 460, 461, 123 N.Y.S.3d 828 [1st Dept. 2020] ; Reynoso v. Tradore, 180 A.D.3d 531, 115 N.Y.S.3d 893 [1st Dept. 2020] ; Sosa–Sanchez v. Reyes, 162 A.D.3d at 414, 75 N.Y.S.3d 27 ).