The Justice Department today filed a lawsuit against Barnet Dulaney Perkins Eye Center PC (BDP), an optometry and ophthalmology medical provider, for discriminating against patients who, because of their disabilities, need assistance in transferring from their wheelchairs to the surgical table for outpatient eye surgery. BDP operates 24 facilities in Arizona. The lawsuit, filed in the US District Court for Arizona, alleges that BDP violated the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) by refusing to provide patients with disabilities the transfer assistance they need — assistance that is routinely provided by healthcare providers across the country. Instead, BDP requires these patients to hire third-party medical support personnel to transport them to and from BDP facilities and to provide transfer assistance at the facilities. Patients who are transported by third-party medical support personnel are brought into the facilities on gurneys or stretchers and are required to remain on them until surgery. This practice denies patients with disabilities full and equal access to BDP’s healthcare services and impermissibly imposes a disability-based surcharge on such patients by forcing them to pay extra for treatment.
