ANÁLISE DAS SENTENÇAS DE PROCESSOS JUDICIAIS ENVOLVENDO A ODONTOLOGIA JULGADOS EM PRIMEIRA INSTÂNCIA NO TRIBUNAL DE JUSTIÇA DE SÃO PAULO NO ANO DE 2019.

Abstract

After the Consumer Protection Code was enacted, several legal adjustments have been incorporated into dental practice to enable patients to demand from the professional the fulfillment of their contractual duties or, otherwise, to be rightfully compensated. This study aimed to analyze first instance dental lawsuits judged at the São Paulo Court of Justice (TJ-SP) in 2019 regarding the following aspects: lawsuit length of time, dental specialty, defendant, court fees, lawsuit class, expert examination, magistrate’s decision based on the expert report, type of obligation established in the lawsuit, civil liability, counterclaim, and judicial decision. The TJ-SP verdict database was searched using the following keywords: "dentist" and "professional liability". A total of 234 lawsuit verdicts were found, which were read in full to obtain the information. The maximum time between lawsuit filing and the trial was 17 years, whilst the minimum time was 1 year. Implantology was the most frequent specialty (42.3%), and moral damage was the most frequently filed procedural class (29.9%). Expert examination was requested in 75.6% of the lawsuits; in 70.9% of these, the magistrate relied on the information provided in the reports to issue a verdict. The obligation of result was the most frequent one in dental practice according to the magistrates, with civil liability established in 140 verdicts. Collectively, these findings highlight the importance of the expert report to support the magistrate’s decision-making and, consequently, to guide the judicial decision.