Facts:

Dr. Arturo Pelayo filed a complaint against Marelo Lauron and Juana Abellana alleging that upon their request, he rendered medical assistance to their daughter-in-law who was about to give birth to a child. The just and equitable value of the services rendered by him was P500, which the defendants refuse to pay without alleging any good reason therefor.

In their Answer, Marelo and Juana alleged that their daughter-in-law had died in consequence of the said childbirth, and that when she was alive she lived with her husband independently and in a separate house without any relation whatever with them, and that, if on the day when she gave birth she was in the house of the defendants, her stay their was accidental and due to fortuitous circumstances; therefore, the defendants should be absolved of the complaint with costs against the plaintiff.


Issue: 

Are  Marelo and Juana obliged to pay petitioner for the medical assistance rendered to their daughter-in-law?


Held:

No. According to article 1089 of the Civil Code, obligations are created by law, by contracts, by quasi-contracts, and by illicit acts and omissions or by those in which any kind of fault or negligence occurs. Obligations arising from law are not presumed. Those expressly determined in the code or in special laws, etc., are the only demandable ones. Obligations arising from contracts have legal force between the contracting parties and must be fulfilled in accordance with their stipulations. (Arts. 1090 and 1091.) 

 The rendering of medical assistance in case of illness was comprised among the mutual obligations to which the spouses were bound by way of mutual support. (Arts. 142 and 143.) If every obligation consists in giving, doing or not doing something (Art. 1088), and spouses were mutually bound to support each other, there can be no question but that, when either of them by reason of illness should be in need of medical assistance, the other was under the unavoidable obligation to furnish the necessary services of a physician in order that health may be restored, and he or she may be freed from the sickness by which life is jeopardized. The party bound to furnish such support was therefore liable for all expenses, including the fees of the medical expert for his professional services. Consequently, the person bound to pay the fees due to the plaintiff for the professional services that he rendered was the husband of the patient.

 Within the meaning of the law, the father and mother-in-law are strangers with respect to the obligation that devolves upon the husband to provide support, among which is the furnishing of medical assistance to his wife at the time of her confinement; and, on the other hand, it does not appear that a contract existed between the defendants and the plaintiff physician, for which reason it is obvious that the former can not be compelled to pay fees which they are under no liability to pay because it does not appear that they consented to bind themselves.. (Pelayo vs. Lauron, G.R. No. L-4089, January 12, 1909)