# Cantu v. Benavides Supreme Court of Texas, No. 25-1028 **Cantu v. Benavides, No. 25-1028, is before the Supreme Court of Texas. Key issue: Whether a health care liability plaintiff's expert report, which names the defendant surgeon only once as the person who performed the C-section and otherwise faults "a reasonable institution" and the hospital's employees for a retained surgical sponge, adequately implicates that surgeon's conduct when read as a whole, or is "no report" as to him.** Practice areas: medical liability, civil procedure ## Key issues - Whether a health care liability plaintiff's expert report, which names the defendant surgeon only once as the person who performed the C-section and otherwise faults "a reasonable institution" and the hospital's employees for a retained surgical sponge, adequately implicates that surgeon's conduct when read as a whole, or is "no report" as to him. - If the report is deficient, whether it was nonetheless a good-faith effort entitling the plaintiff to a chance to amend, and whether the surgeon's months-long delay in objecting forfeited a sufficiency challenge under the 21-day deadline. ## Factual History In March 2022 Priscila Calzada Cantu was admitted to Doctors Hospital of Laredo in labor, and Dr. David Benavides performed a C-section. After discharge she developed severe abdominal pain and was admitted to another hospital, where a CT scan showed an infected foreign object that proved to be a gauze sponge used in the C-section. Two corrective surgeries followed, the second revealing several perforations of her small intestine and requiring resection and the loss of part of her bowel, and she says she still suffers from peritonitis (Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF pp. 12-13). ## Procedural History Cantu sued several health care providers, including Dr. Benavides and his professional association, in the 49th District Court of Webb County. She served an expert report by Dr. Orlando Suris, an OB-GYN, which Benavides's counsel acknowledged receiving on May 17, 2024. In September 2024 Benavides moved to dismiss under Civil Practice and Remedies Code section 74.351, arguing no compliant report had been served; Cantu responded that the report was compliant and that Benavides missed the 21-day deadline to object. On October 3, 2024 Judge Jose A. Lopez denied the motion, found the report inadequate, and gave Cantu 30 days to amend (Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF pp. 13-14; Brief on the Merits (Respondent), PDF p. 8). The Fourth Court of Appeals (Martinez, C.J., Rios and Spears, JJ., Spears authoring, no separate writing) reversed and remanded for dismissal with prejudice and an award of fees and costs, and denied rehearing on October 6, 2025. Benavides v. Cantu, No. 04-24-00733-CV, 2025 WL 2610458 (Tex. App.—San Antonio Sept. 10, 2025, pet. filed) (mem. op.). Cantu petitioned for review on December 19, 2025, the Court requested briefs on the merits on June 12, 2026, and the parties filed on July 27 and September 16, 2026; Cantu's reply is not yet on file (Docket). ## Issues Presented 1. Whether Cantu's expert report is a fair summary of the expert's opinions regarding Benavides's negligence, sufficient to allow the trial court to conclude her claims have merit. 2. Whether the report is a good-faith effort to comply with the expert report requirement, so that she is allowed to amend it to cure any defects (Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF p. 11). Benavides responds that the court of appeals did not err in holding the report was "no report" as to him because it wholly failed to implicate his conduct during the C-section (Brief on the Merits (Respondent), PDF p. 9). ## Legal Arguments **Petitioner (Priscila Calzada Cantu):** An expert report need only show a claim is not frivolous, and its sufficiency is judged by a full and fair reading rather than by particular words or sections. Read as a whole, the report faults her providers for leaving a sponge in her and identifies Benavides, the surgeon who put the sponge in and did not remove it before closing, as the person whose conduct it concerns; under Ogletree v. Matthews a report can be sufficient as to a doctor even if it does not mention him by name. Alternatively, if the report was deficient but not so devoid of substance as to be "no report," Benavides waited many months and missed the 21-day deadline to object, or she should receive the 30-day period under section 74.351(c) to amend. She argues the trial court acted within its discretion and that dismissal with prejudice contradicts this Court's decisions (Brief on the Merits (Petitioner), PDF pp. 16-17, 19, 27-29). **Respondents (Dr. David Benavides, M.D. and David Benavides, M.D., P.A.):** The report mentions Benavides once, in the background, as the person who performed the C-section, and states the standard of care and breach only in terms of what "a reasonable institution" should have done and what the hospital, through its employees, failed to do; it says nothing about his standard of care, breach, or causation. Under Scoresby and Samlowski a report silent on every element as to a defendant is no report as to him, and there is no sponge-specific exception to Chapter 74's good-faith requirement. "Magic words" and reading the report "as a whole" do not cure the omission, and dismissal with prejudice and fees is the proper disposition (Brief on the Merits (Respondent), PDF pp. 25-27; Response to Petition, PDF pp. 12-13). ## Stated Reasons the Court Should Take the Case Cantu argues the decision presents a question of law important to the state's jurisprudence: how specific a report in a health care liability case must be to be sufficient, or to be a good-faith attempt that earns the chance to amend (Petition for Review, PDF p. 10). Benavides responds that the petition identifies nothing novel, no conflict among the courts of appeals and no unresolved question, because report specificity has been exhaustively decided and Cantu does not challenge the rule that a report must implicate the defendant (Response to Petition, PDF pp. 5-6; Brief on the Merits (Respondent), PDF p. 10). ## Practice Area Tags medical-liability, civil-procedure ## Procedural Posture/Vehicle Petition for review from the Fourth Court of Appeals, which reversed an interlocutory order denying a motion to dismiss for an inadequate expert report under Chapter 74 and rendered dismissal with prejudice. The Court requested and received merits briefing from both sides; the petitioner's reply is not yet filed, and the Court has not yet granted the petition. ## Amicus Involvement None --- Source: The SCOTX Report, https://scotxreport.com/cases/25-1028. AI-generated summary of the Court's opinion, orders and the parties' briefs, with pin cites to the page of each document; verify against the Court's own documents at search.txcourts.gov.