This Should Never Have Happen

Especially in California, even when you have all the laws protecting us there are still some people and organizations that think the law doesn’t apply to them.

Transgender Patient Suing Hospital Over Canceled Hysterectomy
CBS Sacramento
By Jennifer McGraw
April 19, 2017

SACRAMENTO COUNTY (CBS13) – A transgender patient is suing Dignity Health for discrimination after canceling an elected hysterectomy.

“As soon as she said, ‘Your hysterectomy is canceled,’ I just fell down to the floor,” said Evan Minton of Orangevale.

Possibly one of the hardest things he’s has had to hear.

Just two days before his scheduled hysterectomy, the doctor called saying the hospital had canceled it.

Why?

Dignity Health does not provide elective sterilizations at its Catholic facilities due to ethical and religious directives.

Looking up Dignity Health I find that the hospital is “a California-based not-for-profit public-benefit corporation.” You got that? It is a public corporation, it is not a private hospital, it’s a licensed public hospital.

The ACLU reports on their website,

“The refusal of Dignity Health to allow a doctor to perform this common procedure simply because the patient is transgender is discriminatory,” said Elizabeth Gill, a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Northern California. “This is a hospital that is open to the general public so it’s illegal for them to turn away someone based on gender identity.”

Dignity Health regularly allows hysterectomies for patients who are not transgender.

“I routinely perform hysterectomies at Mercy San Juan,” said Dr. Lindsey Dawson, Minton’s doctor. “This is the first time the hospital has prevented me from doing this surgery. It’s very clear to me that the surgery was canceled because Evan is transgender.”

The hysterectomy is a medically necessary surgery.

There are some people who will argue that because it is owned and operated by a Catholic organization it is exempt from the non-discrimination laws… wrong! If it was a private hospital and only served the Catholic  community then they are within their rights to discriminate, but because it is a public hospital they have to treat the whole public and not pick who they will treat,

This is not the first time that the ACLU has sued Dignity Health back in June of last year,

The American Civil Liberties Union filed a federal lawsuit against the fifth largest health care system in the U.S., Dignity Health, because it denies transgender employees health insurance coverage for medically necessary transition-related health care.