ADA Case About Nurse's Service Dog in Hospital

Editor: I think you all know that I'm a pretty firm supporter of the ADA, but that I also think people sometimes try to apply the ADA in inappropriate situations. Here's a case that I've had to think long and hard about, and I'm still not entirely sure where I stand. If some of you would like to offer your opinions, I'll do a follow-up article on this intriguing case.

Thanks to the Olathe News and Leonard Hall for permission to reprint this article.

Reader's responses follow the article

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By Leonard Hall

An interesting ADA case appeared in California, where a hard of hearing nurse claimed she was forced to resign from after the hospital failed to accommodate her need for a service dog to help her perform her job duties as a nurse. She filed the lawsuit against the hospital, alleging the hospital refused to accommodate her disability.

Under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), an employer is required to provide reasonable accommodation for employees with disabilities to perform their jobs. For many hard of hearing employees, it may be a matter of acquiring a TDD, installing flashing light system, providing assistive listening devices for easier communication, and several other things to allow the employees to perform their work.

In this case, the Hospital failed to allow accommodation of a service dog for the hard of hearing employee to perform her work.

Even with a lawsuit, the hospital refused to accept the nurse's resignation and is exploring options to accommodate her needs. Hospital staff said that the hospital is in the process of doing a study to determine what areas of the hospital could accommodate a service dog.

It is difficult to find certain places in the hospital to allow an employee to work with a service dog. When you bring an animal into a hospital, there are health and safety issues.

At least the hospital is trying as it has accommodated three other nurses with disabilities in 2002.

The problem arises is the timing of the owner receiving the service dog that requires continuous training in the home and work environment and receiving the accommodations at the hospital. The hospital was not prepared to accept the service dog to accommodate the nurse in her work.

After the nurse got the dog, she received a letter from the hospital telling her not to bring the dog to the hospital. She was placed on indefinite unpaid leave.

For training of a service dog, it is more than picking up it at the training facility and bringing it home. The new owner has to continue with the training for the dog at home and work. In this case, the nurse contacted the hospital months before about the need to provide accommodation for her and the service dog to work at the hospital.

The nurse said the dog would help her by signaling her when people are talking to her and with other normal things such as bells, timers, sounds, and people approaching her.

She could not leave the dog at home during the critical training period, so she submitted her letter of resignation. The nurse said she needs the dog in order to work and needs to work to keep the dog trained, as the dog is required to be with her at all times.

It was unfortunate the hospital did not realize several months before that it should take immediate action to find another position at the hospital. However, it is difficult to find any place at a large hospital to allow service dog or service dog that would meet the safety and health requirements.

(Leonard Hall writes columns on the deaf community and can be reached at Legalnetwk@aol.com.)

Copyright 2003 Olathe News

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Nurse and Hearing Dog - Reader Response

February 2003

Last week we published a story about a nurse who wanted to take her hearing dog to work with her in a hospital. The hospital administration refused to allow her to do that, claiming health concerns among other things. I asked for your thoughts and got several well-considered opinions.

One reader agreed with the hospital. She wrote:

"I feel that the nurse is wrong to expect this. I too worked in various health care settings and cannot imagine such an accommodation. There are enough techno gadgets and certainly personnel training/skills at such sites so that I have trouble thinking the nurse is truly that needy. Regarding training such a dog in that setting it seems needless since the animal does not belong there. Also, some setting would expose the animal to danger...hospitals are not actually "safe"...you have disease, danger from equipment movement, personnel focused on tasks/patients needs ...as well as those people who suffer from emotional distress, mental illness etc. Time for that nurse to truly utilize other means of meeting her job requirements."

Sharon Campbell, M.A. (slccom@hotmail.com), a Certified Safety Professional, disagrees. She replied:

"The 'health and safety' issues of having a dog in the hospital are not so severe. They let 'therapy dogs' in for regular visits. These dogs are properly vaccinated, trained and, presumably, clean when they come to visit patients. The only diseases they pass to humans are rabies, and some infections if they bite. Simply breathing around a dog isn't enough to make anyone ill unless they have severe allergies. Dogs are often residents at nursing homes. My bet? Someone in the back office said, 'but if we let HER do it everyone will want to!'

"With the nurse shortage, I can't imagine how that administration can afford to throw her away.

"I don't think her request was at all unreasonable, and hope she pursues her career with a better employer."

And finally, Loretta Butler of Tucson, comes down somewhere in the middle. She says:

"When first reading the article about the nurse being denied to have her service dog on the job with her, I thought that decision is probably appropriate. I assumed this meant the dog would accompany her into patient's rooms as she took care of them. Probably some patients would object to having a dog in their room.

"Then I wondered if patients are allowed to have their service dogs accompany them in the hospital, particularly if the patient is blind and needs a service dog to get around.

"Looking at it from the dog's point of view though, I think the dog would be over-taxed with the noises on a hospital ward. All the dings, bells, telephone rings, intercom messages, etc. would be confusing to the animal who is trained to alert its master to such goings on. Also the nurse would be constantly alerted to all those above sounds that probably would not apply to her. The dog would not be able to distinguish which sounds to alert her to and which to not alert her to."

I guess we've covered all possible positions ;-}