Back Problems: Court Finds No Disability Discrimination.
Legal Eagle Eye Newsletter for the Nursing Profession
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June 2017
The employee has the responsibility to inform the employer of the need for reasonable accommodation for a disability. The employee must identify his or her disability and limitations and suggest the reasonable accommodation that is believed to be necessary from the employer.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT MISSISSIPPI May 10, 2017An aide was terminated right after an incident in which she directed another aide to give an IM injection to calm down an agitated patient. Her termination also cured her supervisors’ headaches caused by her taking days off and using extended medical leaves for a back problem which, after her termination, she claimed was a disability. The aide tried to argue the incident was not legitimate grounds for termination because she was a student nurse extern with authority at this hospital to give and to supervise the administration of prn meds. The hospital countered that she was not an enrolled nurse extern and had no such authority, which made her conduct wholly inappropriate.
The US District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi found no disability discrimination. Before she was terminated the aide never told her employer she considered her back problem a disability and never identified any specific accommodation she wanted because of her disability. Even if she had asked to take an indefinite medical leave while her employer waited for her to return to work, that would not have been a reasonable accommodation, the Court said.
Williams v. Commissioners, 2017 WL 1957971 (N.D. Miss., May 10, 2017).More references from nursinglaw.com
http://www.nursinglaw.com/backinjury.htm
http://www.nursinglaw.com/backinjury2.htm
http://www.nursinglaw.com/back-injury-patient-lift.htm
http://www.nursinglaw.com/lifting1.htm
http://www.nursinglaw.com/lifting2.htm
http://www.nursinglaw.com/lifting3.htm
http://www.nursinglaw.com/lifting4.htm