Declaration Sufficient To Survive Summary Judgment.

In granting a summary judgment motion in favor of designers and manufacturers of a prosthetic hip device, the trial judge excluded portions of the plaintiff’s expert declaration opposing the motion after sustaining defendants’ objections on various grounds, including lack of expert qualification, lack of an explanation, or reasoning to support the expert opinion, lack of foundation and relevance. The Court of Appeal reversed, stating:  “In this case, [plaintiff’s expert] declared that he ‘conducted extensive examinations of the portions of the prosthetic device that were removed from [plaintiff] using visual examination, optical microscopic examination, x-ray radiography, fluorescent dye penetrant examination, scanning electron microscopy, and such destructive testing as hardness testing, micro-hardness testing, microstructural analysis, and chemical analysis.’ He declared that he had determined, based on his examinations, that the fractured portion of the prosthesis was softer than the ‘minimum required hardness’ in two of the three ASTM specifications . . . and was less than the ‘expected hardness’ of the third specification. We believe that this explanation is sufficient to support his opinion for purposes of opposing the summary judgment motion. In our view, [plaintiff’s expert’s] failure to describe the particular testing processes that he used to arrive at his conclusions regarding the hardness of the prosthesis and his failure to more particularly describe the results of that testing do not in any manner indicate that his conclusions are speculative, conjectural, or lack a reasonable basis.” Garrett v. Howmedica Osteonics  (Cal. App. Second Dist., Div. 3; November 27, 2012) 211 Cal.App.4th 389.