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This paper was originally published in the Proceedings of the Twelfth Annual Interdisciplinary Health Team Care Conference, which took place September 20-22, 1990 at the Indiana University School of Medicine in Indianapolis, Indiana.  It is reproduced here with the permission of the author.

The purpose of this paper is to report the results of an exploratory study focusing on the nature of legal obligations that exist between medical and nursing practitioners. These legal obligations were identified by a content analysis of thirteen appellate court cases from a variety of states where the actions of both professional disciplines were relevant to the case. Appellate cases are those that have been unresolved in lower courts. These cases were located initially through a computer search of Index Medicus articles dealing with nursing and malpractice. Complete descriptions of the cases were obtained from the regional reporter series published by West Publishing Company.
No attempt has been made to be exhaustive in the examination of such cases. Rather, the goal has been to begin to explore the nature of legal expectations. Examples of cases located will be described with a focus on retrieving information pertaining to the nature of obligations between professionals. Then, the case presentations will be linked to literature on the dynamics of team relationships. Ideas for future research pertaining to these issues will be explored.