Almost anything may be stipulated which is not contrary to public policy, and a breach of any such stipulation entitles the aggrieved party to rescind the contract and cease from performing it.[163] _Qualifications of the Rule that Express Contracts may Include any Stipulation._—Some qualifications of this rule of law must, however, be noted. A breach by the patient of any one of these stipulations would entitle the physician to treat the engagement as terminated like any other contractual relation, and to bring his action for a recovery for services rendered up to the time of the breach; but it is doubtful whether he would have any action for damages for failure to permit him to perform further services. This doubt arises from the legal doctrine, hereinbefore referred to, that a patient is always at liberty to dismiss his physician at any time without notice, and without assigning any cause, which recognizes and grows out of the fact that if the trust and confidence of the patient are destroyed, or impaired, no matter how unreasonably or unjustly, the relation between them must thereafter be unprofitable to both parties, and dangerous to the patient. On the other hand there is little doubt but that whenever an express contract is made by a physician to treat a patient for a certain length of time for a particular disease or injury, the physician is not at liberty to arbitrarily terminate that relation or his connection with the case, unless he has in the contract specifically reserved the right so to do. _Contracts Making Payment Contingent upon Successful Treatment Valid._—The express contract between the parties may also contain a stipulation, by which the physician makes his compensation contingent upon his effecting a cure. Smith _v._ Hyde, 19 Vt., 54; Mack _v._ Kelly, 3 Ala., 387. See also Coughlin _v._ N. Y. Cen. R. R. Co., 71 N. Y., 443. In such a case, however, if the patient does not permit the physician opportunity to treat him during the time named in the contract, or for a reasonable time, if no specific time is fixed, the courts would probably permit the physician to recover a reasonable compensation for his services for the time during which he treated his patient. _Physician must Allow Reasonable Time to Supply his Place if he Quits his Patient._—In any event, whether the contract be express or implied, conditional or unconditional, the law through motives of public policy, and with a just regard for the welfare of the sick and injured, undoubtedly requires that if a physician has once taken charge of a case, and determines to abandon it, he must give the patient reasonable notice and reasonable opportunity to supply his place. If he fails to do this he is liable in damages for the results that follow as the proximate consequence of his abandoning the case.