Trial Court Finds That Defendant Waived Arbitration Clause in Nursing Home Case by Litigating Case in Court

 

In the case of the Estate of Smalling v. 2990 Holm Operating, LLC, Jan. Term 2024, No. 240102492 (C.P. Phila. Co. Dec. 9, 2025 Cohen, J.), the trial court issued a Rule 1925 Opinion requesting the appellate court to uphold the trial court’s decision to deny a Defendant’s Motion to Compel an Arbitration in a nursing home case.

In this matter, the Plaintiffs allege that their family member decedent had passed away due to alleged negligence treatment received at the Defendant’s facility.

After the Plaintiffs had filed suit, the case proceeded with pleadings and discovery. Fourteen months after the lawsuit was filed, the Defendants filed a Petition to Compel Arbitration.

The court denied the Petition under the primary rationale that the Defendants had waived its right to compel arbitration by availing itself of the judicial process. The court noted that, here, there was a significant delay of over one year before the Defendant sought to compel arbitration. Given the delay and the active litigation in the lawsuit, including the filing of earlier Preliminary Objections by the Defendant, the trial court found a waiver of the right of the Defendant to request arbitration.

In so ruling, the trial court did not reach the Plaintiffs’ other arguments that the arbitration clause in the nursing home agreement was unenforceable under the doctrines of procedural and substantive unconscionability, and/or the argument that the person who had signed the arbitration agreement did not have the power to bind the decedent to the arbitration agreement.

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Source: The Legal Intelligencer Common Pleas Case Alert, www.Law.com (Feb. 12, 2026).