Obama orders hospital visitation rights for gays, lesbians

[alfred russel]

President Obama has asked the Department of Health and Human Services to establish a rule that would prevent hospitals from denying visitation privileges to gay and lesbian partners.

The president's Thursday memo said, "There are few moments in our lives that call for greater compassion and companionship than when a loved one is admitted to the hospital. ... Yet every day, all across America, patients are denied the kindnesses and caring of a loved one at their sides."

Gay and lesbian Americans are "uniquely affected" by relatives-only policies at hospitals, Obama said, adding that they "are often barred from the bedsides of the partners with whom they may have spent decades of their lives -- unable to be there for the person they love, and unable to act as a legal surrogate if their partner is incapacitated."

When Lisa Pond collapsed during a family vacation in Florida three years ago, her partner of 17 years was kept away from her hospital room.

Janice Langbehn begged and waited for hours to stand by Pond's bedside at Miami's Jackson Memorial Hospital, but it wasn't until her partner's sister arrived that she got any information. In the end, the person Pond was closest to was relegated to a waiting room as she died from an aneurysm.

"To hold Lisa's hand wasn't a gay right, it was a human right," Langbehn told CNN on Thursday.

Obama requested that the regulation make clear that any hospital receiving Medicare and Medicaid funding, which includes the vast majority of U.S. hospitals, must allow patients to decide who can visit them and prohibit discrimination based on a variety of characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender identity.

The president listed widows and widowers without children and members of certain religious orders among those who suffer under the policy.

The memo was welcomed by gays and lesbians, who have used the restrictions on hospital visitation as an argument in favor of same-sex marriage.

"In the absence of gay people being able to legally marry in most jurisdictions, this is a step to rectify a gross inequity," said David Smith, an executive at the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest gay rights group. "Because without gay marriage, much more inequities exist. It should be applauded."

Smith said the organization had been working with the Obama administration for months on the request, and that it was sparked by the case of an Olympia, Washington, lesbian couple who were kept apart as one died from an aneurysm while hospitalized in Miami, Florida. The rule would help hundreds of thousands of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender families, he said.

Obama's memo also requires the HHS regulations to guarantee hospitals honor all patients' advance directives, which include stipulations such as who should make health care decisions if the patient isn't able to do so. The memo also directs the department to look into any other health care barriers that pose challenges to such families and make recommendations to the president on them within 180 days.

He pointed out that North Carolina recently amended its Patients' Bill of Rights to give each patient "the right to designate visitors who shall receive the same visitation privileges as the patient's immediate family members, regardless of whether the visitors are legally related to the patient." Delaware, Nebraska and Minnesota have adopted similar laws, the memo said.

For Langbehn, a call from Obama about the order was a humbling experience. For years, she pressed the Florida hospital for an apology, and never got one. On Thursday, she received an apology from the president for how her family was treated.

The key part of the new rule would be that patients would have the right to pick their "circle of intimacy," Langbehn said, which means her partner "didn't die in vain."

http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/04/15/hospital.gay.visitation/index.html

Good for Obama. And this is a case where expanded gay rights also means expanded rights for everyone else.

[Josephus]

[sarcasm] MY GOD. He really is a communist. [/sarcasm]

[Admiral Yi]

Why are there any limits at all?

[Faeelin]

Why are there any limits at all?

The hospital's argument is that since there was no legal relationship between the parties, they would be bound to let just anybody walk into the hospital room if a person wanted.

I'm trying to be happy about this, but there was nothing stopping him from doing this a year ago and it's not like anyone is going to be outraged by this.

[Admiral Yi]

The hospital's argument is that since there was no legal relationship between the parties, they would be bound to let just anybody walk into the hospital room if a person wanted.

How is that a problem?

[Faeelin]

The hospital's argument is that since there was no legal relationship between the parties, they would be bound to let just anybody walk into the hospital room if a person wanted.

How is that a problem?

In emergency situations you need to keep the room clear.

It was persuasive enough for a district judge in Florida...

[Alexandru H.]

What a stupid regulation... 

So is this some kind of last "cock-sucking fest" / "pussy-licking fest" before death?

[Admiral Yi]

What a stupid regulation... 

So is this some kind of last "cock-sucking fest" / "pussy-licking fest" before death?

Give it a fucking rest man.

[DontSayBanana]

What a stupid regulation... 

So is this some kind of last "cock-sucking fest" / "pussy-licking fest" before death?

I propose that Romanian trolls be only allowed Gypsy visitors.

[Jacob]

What a stupid regulation... 

So is this some kind of last "cock-sucking fest" / "pussy-licking fest" before death?

You're an idiot.

[Faeelin]

Here's some of the holding, from Langbehn v. Public Health Trust of Miami-Dade County:

Ms. Langbehn informed the admitting clerk at Ryder that she was Ms. Pond's life partner and offered to provide relevant medical history and information. She also indicated that was the family member who was to receive information about Ms. Pond's condition, explained that the children were their jointly adopted children, and emphasized her need to be with Ms. Pond as soon as possible. The admitting clerk, who controlled family members' access to emergency personnel attending patients at Ryder, rejected Ms. Langbehn's offer to provide information about Ms. Pond. She also refused to provide Ms. Langbehn with information about Ms. Pond's condition, and over the next eight hours, denied the family the ability to see or be with Ms. Pond.

Subsequently, Garnett Frederick, a Jackson social worker, spoke to Ms. Langbehn. He told Ms. Langbehn that she should not expect to be provided any information about or access to Ms. Pond because they were in an "anti-gay city and state." Mr. Frederick also told Ms. Langbehn that, because it was a holiday weekend, she would not be able to get before a court in order to secure the legal papers necessary for her to get information about or access to Ms. Pond.....

At 4:15 p.m., doctors at Ryder determined that Ms. Pond had experienced an aneurysm.FN4 At approximately the same time, Ryder personnel received, by fax, a copy of Ms. Pond's executed power of attorney, which allowed Ms. Langbehn to act as Ms. Pond's guardian and make medical decisions in case of incapacity. That document was then placed in Ms. Pond's patient file. Despite receipt of the power of attorney, no one at Ryder, including the defendants, acknowledged the legal effect of the document, or allowed Ms. Langbehn to have information about, or access to, Ms. Pond. The plaintiffs allege that Doctors Zauner and Cruz knew, or should have known, about the executed power of attorney.

My understanding, of course, is that there's some sort of legal relationship many heterosexual couples have that automatically grants both parties the right to make medical decisions if someone is incapable of doing so. Anybody know what it's called?

[garbon]

I'm trying to be happy about this, but there was nothing stopping him from doing this a year ago and it's not like anyone is going to be outraged by this.

[Caliga]

What a stupid regulation... 

So is this some kind of last "cock-sucking fest" / "pussy-licking fest" before death?

The Fate Rule is hereby renamed the Fate-Alexandru Rule.

[garbon]

The Fate Rule is hereby renamed the Fate-Alexandru Rule.

About time.

[CountDeMoney]

Why are there any limits at all?

There aren't really.  I've worked for two major hospitals in my time, and I've never seen anybody like that barred from visitations.  Hospitals are very sensitive on that issue.  Then again, it's Florida in the case listed above.