U.S. Commission on Civil Rights Adopts Recommendations Made by Akron’s Public Health Law & Science Center
The eagerly anticipated Statutory Enforcement Report, Patient Dumping, issued by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights was released in the last week of September 2014. The Report adopts several recommendations made by Professor Katharine Van Tassel in her testimony before the Commission in Washington D.C. last April, 2014 and in her Written Statement submitted to the Commission. The Report was sent directly from the Commissioners to President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and Speaker of the House, John Boehner.
The research that formed the background for the Written Statement was performed by the Student Research Team for the Public Health & Law Center at Akron Law (pictured), along with the expert support of the Akron staff members of the PHLSC team, Anthony Colucci and Amy McCoy. This Written Statement was cited multiple times in the report.
"This was definitely a team effort," states Professor Van Tassel. "It is amazing how our team pulled together to help with my testimony and with the research for the Written Statement. It shows what we can do together here at Akron Law to improve the human condition."
"Patient dumping" is the practice of hospitals' denying individuals emergency medical screening and stabilization services, or transferring them to other hospitals, once a hospital discovers that the patients are uninsured or have no means to pay for treatment.
The Report examines the effectiveness of the federal law that Congress passed to address such practices: the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA). The Report discusses what policies may be adopted to better protect the rights of the mentally ill, and makes detailed findings and recommendations for improvements. The recommendations include:
- Better data collection
- Increased regulatory oversight
- Non-punitive methods for hospital reporting
- Electronic filtering of data that automatically flags inadequate reporting data
- Linking budgets of community-based mental health programs with local hospitals to recover costs from patients treated in centers rather than hospitals
- Making it mandatory for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to forward all EMTALA cases to the Office for Civil Rights in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
- Increased training and education
- Conforming EMTALA's definition of stabilization so that it is consistent with the medical definition
- Fostering learning from best practices
- Implementing consistent protocols and discharge planning
Martin R. Castro, Chairman of the Commission, stated, "We are pleased to share this important Report with the President, Congress and the American people and hope that our findings and recommendations serve to improve the conditions that were presented to the Commission during the briefing."
The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights is an independent, bipartisan agency charged with advising the President and Congress on civil rights matters and issuing an annual federal civil rights enforcement report. For information about Commission's reports and meetings, visit http://www.usccr.gov.