https://www.canlii.org/en/on/onsc/doc/2014/2014onsc6828/2014onsc6828.html
[6] Cira is not a party to this litigation. It is a national company in the business of providing medical assessments and health services for several corporate, insurance and medical legal communities through a network of independent health professionals. Cira was created in June 2012 and is a combination of two companies, namely, Riverfront Medical Services (“Riverfront”) and Medisys IMA.
[7] The Defendants retained Cira to co-ordinate defence medical examinations of Ms. Burwash conducted pursuant to s. 105 of the Courts of Justice Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. C.43.
[8] The Defendants do not object to the production of the files.
[9] The Defendants have requested disclosure of Cira’s complete files. The Plaintiffs allege that only partial production of the files has been made to date.
Timing of the Motion
[10] The Plaintiffs assert that they had no reason to suspect that Cira was involved in the review, revision and editing of draft expert reports until the examination for discovery of Dr. St. Pierre when answers and subsequent productions indicated that Cira may be using third parties to review and revise the Defendants’ expert reports.
[11] I am satisfied that the Plaintiffs have brought this motion at the earliest opportunity and that they could not have reasonably discovered that the issue existed any earlier.
[28] Rule 53.03 of the Rules of Civil Procedure is designed to ensure the independence and integrity of the expert witness. The duty of the expert witness is to be of assistance to the court. Each expert witness is required to sign an acknowledgement that they are providing an independent and unbiased opinion. If there is reason to believe that the expert’s report or opinion has been influenced by unknown third parties and is therefore not entirely the expert’s opinion, the fundamental rationale for accepting expert opinion evidence is no longer present and hence the report is not only not helpful to the court but may become misleading. This is an issue that is directly related to trial fairness.