The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) recently announced through a press release that it had filed a federal employment discrimination lawsuit against Roland Park Rehabilitation and Healthcare Center (Roland Park RHC) and its management company, Atlas Healthcare. The lawsuit was brought after Roland Park RHC terminated a pregnant certified nursing assistant because she was temporarily restricted by her doctor from lifting and moving patients, which could be unsafe for a pregnant woman.
As a certified nursing assistant, the worker had to move and adjust elderly residents in the healthcare facility to prevent bed sores from forming. She expected to be accommodated and relegated to light-duty work, such as other nursing tasks that didn’t require lifting patients. Instead, she was fired and told to reapply after her pregnancy was over because Roland Park RHC's policy stated that light or modified duties could only be granted to workers with on-the-job injuries. The EEOC complaint states that the termination and lack of even attempting to find accommodation for her is a direct violation of the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA).
Roland Park RHC and Atlas Healthcare have not yet released a public response to the allegation and lawsuit.
History of Staffing Issues at Nursing Homes Might Have Played a Part
At Brown & Barron, LLC, we have focused much of our practice on nursing home abuse and neglect cases in Baltimore and throughout Maryland. With our insight as nursing home abuse attorneys, we think that there might be something else at play behind the scenes of the certified nursing assistant’s termination at Roland Park Rehabilitation and Healthcare Center: the infamous history of understaffing issues at many nursing homes across the country.
Turning and repositioning residents who are at risk of pressure ulcers is one of the most important jobs of a nursing facility. A nursing home without enough staff who can lift and reposition residents increases the risk of bed sores. Hiring another certified nursing assistant to handle that role while the pregnant worker was moved to light-duty work would have increased the Roland Park RHC’s overall payroll, so it might be that the company decided to fire her and hire someone else, keeping the total number of workers (and paychecks) the same.
No matter the reasoning behind the worker’s termination, it caught the attention of the EEOC and brought a lawsuit against the nursing care facility. It might be fair to say that nursing homes in general need to do better with not just how many employees are kept on staff but also how those employees are treated.
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