LGBT groups propose hospital guidelines
Lambda Legal, the Gay & Lesbian Medical Association and the National Health Law Program have filed 26 pages of comments on proposed guidelines to eliminate discrimination in visitation against the families of LGBT patients published in June by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services ( HHS ) , according to a Lambda Legal press release.
The department had invited comment from the public, as well as experts on healthcare and LGBT issues. President Barack Obama—motivated by the case of Janice Langbehn, who was denied access to dying partner Lisa Pond—issued a memo in April directing HHS to develop new hospital-visitation guidelines. Among the subjects that the three LGBT-rights organizations’ guidelines cover are: —who may visit when an incapacitated patient has not designated someone to make decisions; —patient-visitor documentation not being discriminatorily applied to LGBT individuals;
—visitation rules having explicit non-discriminatory language to protect LGBT patients; and —an appeals procedure for visitation denials, with patients being informed about it.
