Claim Review
Claim Review is based on an actual professional liability claim but is not intended to parallel exactly the events and proceedings. Certain facts have been altered slightly to emphasize risk-related issues. The lessons offered in the Risk Management Considerations section are applicable to healthcare professionals in all specialties. In this issue, we revisit an older claim because of its relevance to current areas of growing risk.
Editor’s note: The Americans with Disabilities Act, (ADA) which protects the rights of the disabled, has been in effect since 1990. Claims alleging violations of the ADA continue to present, as highlighted in the claim discussion below, and warrant consideration of some of the ADA requirements that apply to the delivery of health care in hospitals and physician offices.
Also, consider that a New Jersey law, the Law Against Discrimination, protects persons with physical or mental handicaps. Those protections and others—including some related to healthcare—are extended to persons living in a domestic partnership by the New Jersey Domestic Partnership Act. As such, and while not directly related to this particular Claim Review, a basic level of understanding of this act is equally important to all healthcare practices.
Consider in the claim below if the patient's civil rights were violated, and if medical staff provided an acceptable standard of care.
Defendants
Hospital and hospital staff, including a treating physician, a pediatrician, and a nurse.
Claimants
First-time parents who are both deaf
Description of Incident
A pregnant woman, who is deaf, is emotionally traumatized after receiving care from a hospital during her labor, delivery and recovery
Summary of Case
During her three-day stay in defendant hospital, the woman underwent common procedures relating to childbirth, and delivered a healthy baby. However, a translator was not present in the labor and delivery rooms.
The Details
A pregnant, deaf woman was admitted to the hospital for delivery of her first child. Prior to her admission, the patient and her husband had planned and arranged for a sign language interpreter to translate instructions relating to her childbirth. Upon arrival, the patient was immediately taken to the delivery room, prohibiting her from personally contacting her pre-arranged translator. The defendant hospital lacked staff translator services. The plaintiff asserts that she repeatedly requested the assistance of an interpreter, but was denied.
Her father, who later arrived at the hospital, was capable of interpreting for her, but was denied access to the delivery room to assist. The hospital staff told the patient that only her husband, who is also deaf but can read lips, was allowed in the delivery room. However, the husband, who had been present when the patient was first admitted, left to go to work when he and his wife learned that it was going to be a long labor.
Throughout her labor, the patient repeatedly asked a nurse to contact either the translator with whom she previously made arrangements, a staff translator, or, again, to allow her father into the delivery room. She was told that an interpreter was not necessary for the delivery procedure.
Little effort was made to inform the patient about treatment and procedures relative to the delivery. The staff was required to wear surgical masks in the delivery room. Therefore, the patient was unable to read lips, which would have provided her some, though limited, understanding capability. Following the delivery, a nurse took the healthy baby away to clean him without communicating that it was a routine procedure.
The Care
At another point during her hospital stay, the patient was showering in her room when a pediatrician who was assigned to her delivery but was not her regular doctor, entered the room and called out to the patient. When the patient did not respond the pediatrician pulled the shower curtain back.
In addition, claimant stated that the pediatrician denied another request from the patient for a translator and did not convey messages to a nurse. The pediatrician also made offensive comments to the patient’s mother-in-law during the patient’s recovery, suggesting that deaf people “have no right” to have children.
In a separate incident during recovery, according to the plaintiff, the nurse who denied translation service to the patient had tossed an icepack to the patient instead of handing it to her or placing it on her.
Allegations & Damages 