CAA - 23VE02156

CAA - 23VE02156
Court:	CAA (France)
Jurisdiction:	France
Relevant Law:	Article 16 GDPR Article 17 GDPR
Decided:	11.12.2025
Published:
Parties:	Centre Hospitalier Eaubonne Montmorency
National Case Number/Name:	23VE02156
European Case Law Identifier:
Appeal from:	TA de Cergy-Pontois (France)
Appeal to:	Unknown
Original Language(s):	French
Original Source:	Legifrance (in French)
Initial Contributor:	dt

A court found that a patient cannot request from a hospital the rectification of a medical assessment since this assessment constitutes a subjective opinion. The court held that this is the case even when the controller’s diagnosis differs from subsequent diagnoses.

English Summary

Facts

The data subject was hospitalised in the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Centre (the controller) in 2019. The first medical report created at the time of hospitalisation indicated a diagnosis of bipolar affective disorder, among others.

The data subject showed that the controller issued a second medical report during the same hospital visit with a diagnosis of an adjustment disorder. Furthermore, she submitted medical reports from other hospitals ruling out the diagnosis of bipolar disorder.

In 2020, the data subject made a request to the controller for the rectification of the initial medical diagnosis under Article 16 GDPR and Article 17 GDPR. The controller rejected her request and the data subject filed a petition before the Administrative Court of Cergy-Pontoise for an order to correct the medical records. The petition was rejected by the court.

The data subject filed an appeal with the Administrative Court of Appeals of Versailles to overturn the judgment of the Administrative Court of Cergy-Pontoise. In the appeal, the data subject sought the same order for rectification.

Holding

The court rejected the data subject’s appeal.

The court noted that the initial diagnosis was the result of subjective medical assessments of the data subject’s state of health. Moreover, the court emphasised that a different subsequent diagnosis did not imply that the initial diagnosis was inaccurate. Therefore, the court found that the diagnosis cannot be subject to the right of rectification.

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English Machine Translation of the Decision

The decision below is a machine translation of the French original. Please refer to the French original for more details.

Versailles Administrative Court of Appeal, 5th Chamber, December 11, 2025, 23VE02156, Unpublished in the Lebon Digest
Versailles Administrative Court of Appeal - 5th Chamber

No. 23VE02156
Unpublished in the Lebon Digest

Heard on Thursday, December 11, 2025

President
Ms. RIBEIRO-MENGOLI

Rapporteur
Ms. Pauline OZENNE

Public Rapporteur
Ms. FLORENT

Attorney(s)
BERNE

Full Text
FRENCH REPUBLIC
IN THE NAME OF THE FRENCH PEOPLE

Having regard to the following procedure:

Prior litigation:

Ms. B... C... requested the Cergy-Pontoise Administrative Court to annul the decision of August 17, 2020, by which the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center rejected her request to rectify her personal data and, where applicable, to The court requested an expert assessment, an order compelling the hospital to correct its medical records, and, before ruling on the merits, an expert assessment to identify errors in its hospitalization reports.

By judgment No. ... of ..., the Administrative Court of Cergy-Pontoise dismissed her claims.

Proceedings before the Court:

By an application and a brief, filed on September 18 and November 27, 2023, Ms. C..., represented by Mr. Berne, requests the Court:

1) to set aside this judgment;

2) to annul, for abuse of power, this decision of August 17, 2020;

3) to order the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center to correct her medical data and, as a preliminary matter, to order an expert assessment, pursuant to Article R. 621-1 of the Code of Administrative Justice, to identify the errors in her hospitalization reports;

4) to order the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center to pay her €3,600 pursuant to Article L. 761-1 of the Code of Administrative Justice.

She argues that:

- the refusal to correct her personal data mentioned in various hospitalization reports, relating to the diagnosis of bipolar disorder, the existence of behavioral problems, and her medical history, violates Articles 16 and 17 of Regulation (EU) 2016/679, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), given the inaccuracy of this data;

- An expert assessment should be ordered to confirm the erroneous nature of this data.

In a statement of defense filed on October 26, 2023, the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center, represented by Mr. Tordjman, requests that the application be dismissed and that Ms. C... be ordered to pay €1,500 pursuant to Article L. 761-1 of the Code of Administrative Justice.

It argues that the grounds invoked by Ms. C... are unfounded.

Having regard to the other documents in the file.

Having regard to:

- Regulation (EU) No. 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016;

- Law No. 78-17 of 6 January 1978;

- the Code of Administrative Justice.

The parties were duly notified of the hearing date.

The following were heard during the public hearing:

- the report by Ms. Ozenne,

- the submissions of Ms. Florent, Public Rapporteur;

- and the observations of Mr. El Boustani, counsel for the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center.

Considering the following:

1. Ms. C... requested, by letter dated October 1, 2019, that the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center correct personal data relating to her medical history and the diagnosis of her condition, which she considers inaccurate, appearing in her medical file, and more specifically in an initial version of a hospitalization report dated ..., in a letter dated ..., and in a hospitalization report dated .... By decision dated August 17, 2020, the hospital center rejected this request. Ms. C... is appealing the judgment dated ... by which the Cergy-Pontoise Administrative Court dismissed her request.

2. Article 5(1) of Regulation (EU) 2016/680 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (A...) provides that: "Personal data shall be: / (d) accurate and, where necessary, kept up to date; every reasonable step shall be taken to ensure that personal data which are inaccurate, having regard to the purposes for which they are processed, are erased or rectified without delay (...)." Article 16 of that Regulation states: "The data subject shall have the right to obtain from the controller without undue delay the rectification of inaccurate personal data concerning him or her. (...)." Pursuant to Article 50 of the Law of 6 January 1978, the right to rectification is exercised under the conditions set out in Article 16 of the aforementioned Regulation.

3. Firstly, pursuant to the provisions recalled in the preceding point, the data subject has the right to obtain from the controller, without undue delay, the rectification of personal data concerning him or her which are relevant to the purposes of the processing and which he or she establishes are materially inaccurate, where such rectification is not likely to affect those purposes. The right to rectification provided for by these provisions does not, however, extend to subjective opinions or other subjective personal data contained in the processing.

4. It appears from the case file that the hospitalization report of Ms. C..., who was admitted between ... and ... to the psychiatric ward of the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center, initially contained a diagnosis of "F31.2" for "bipolar affective disorder, current manic episode with psychotic symptoms," as well as a personal psychiatric history consisting of psychotherapeutic treatment for eating disorders. In support of her request to correct this information in the report, Ms. C... argues that it is objectively inaccurate because the author drafted a second version of the report for the same hospitalization, which, in her case, gave a diagnosis of "F43," meaning "reaction to a severe stressor and adjustment disorder," and no longer mentioned any personal psychiatric history. The applicant also produced another hospitalization report, also mentioning the same diagnosis "F43," a letter from a specialist physician at the Fernand Widal Hospital's expert center for bipolar disorders, ruling out the possibility of establishing a diagnosis of bipolar mood disorder at the time of its drafting, a letter from a psychiatrist certifying that he had not observed any psychological disturbances belonging to the depressive, bipolar, or psychotic category during this period, and finally, the recognition, on [date missing], of the occupational nature of her illness by the Val-d'Oise primary health insurance fund, which made no mention of any bipolar disorder.

5. However, on the one hand, it follows from what is stated in point 3 that the initial diagnosis of the disorders affecting Ms. C... resulted from subjective medical assessments of her state of health and therefore cannot entitle her to have it rectified. The fact that the doctor who made the initial diagnosis issued a different diagnosis on the same day does not render the first diagnosis materially inaccurate and therefore subject to this right of rectification. Furthermore, the applicant does not seriously contest the hospital's assertion that the second version of the report of her initial hospitalization was in fact written at her request, nor that the medical diagnosis favored by the hospital is actually broader but does not exclude the existence of bipolar disorder. Moreover, the wording of the certificates and letters from [names omitted] and [names omitted] mentioned in the preceding point remains cautious and cannot be considered as excluding such disorders. On the other hand, while Ms. C... also requests the rectification of entries relating to medical history concerning eating disorders on several documents in her medical file, she provides no evidence to establish their inaccuracy. Consequently, the plea based on the infringement of Article 16 of Regulation (EU) 2016/680 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 must be dismissed.

6. Secondly, the appellant reiterates on appeal her argument based on the inaccuracy of the data relating to her medical history and her plea based on the infringement of Article 17 of the General Data Protection Regulation, without providing any new and relevant evidence. This plea must therefore be dismissed for the reasons correctly given in paragraphs 5, 7 and 8 of the judgment under appeal.

7. Lastly, it follows from the foregoing that the expert assessment requested by Ms. C... pursuant to Article R. 621-1 is not useful and therefore cannot be ordered.

8. It follows from all the foregoing that Ms. C... is not justified in claiming that the Administrative Court of Cergy-Pontoise erred in dismissing her application in the contested judgment. Consequently, her claims for costs under Article L. 761-1 of the Code of Administrative Justice must be dismissed. Furthermore, in the circumstances of this case, there is no reason to order Ms. C... to pay the sum claimed by the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center under the same provisions.

DECIDES:
Article 1: Ms. C...'s application is dismissed.

Article 2: The Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center's claims under Article L. 761-1 of the Code of Administrative Justice are dismissed.

Article 3: This judgment shall be served on Ms. B... C... and the Eaubonne Montmorency Hospital Center.

Deliberated after the hearing of November 27, 2025, at which the following judges were present:

Ms. Ribeiro-Mengoli, presiding judge,
Ms. Ozenne, senior judge,

Ms. Bahaj, senior judge.

Made public by filing with the court registry on December 11, 2025.

The rapporteur,
P. Ozenne
The presiding judge,
N. Ribeiro-Mengoli
The clerk,
C. Richard
The Republic directs and orders the Prefect of Val-d'Oise, insofar as it concerns him, or any bailiff so requested, with respect to ordinary legal proceedings against private parties, to ensure the execution of this decision.

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