Transgender man can sue California hospital after Supreme Court decision not to hear appeal
The U.S. Supreme Court announced Monday that it would not hear arguments on a California appeals court decision that let a Sacramento-area transgender man sue Mercy San Juan Medical Center over its cancellation of his hysterectomy.
The 1st District Court of Appeal in San Francisco ruled in September 2019 that Evan Minton could sue the Carmichael-based hospital over the last-minute change in his care, overturning a lower-court ruling that dismissed the case.
Leaders of Mercy San Juan, a hospital operated by Chicago-based CommonSpirit Health and its subsidiary Dignity Health, had maintained that the Constitution’s guarantee of free exercise of religion and free speech protected its decisions in the case.
“Dignity Health stands against discrimination of all kinds, and we have long been devoted to serving people who struggle to get the health care they need,” the company said in a statement released Monday. “This is the legacy of the sisters who founded our Catholic hospitals and believed that health care is a human right. We provide care to everyone regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity or expression.”
Minton and his attorney, Elizabeth Gill of the ACLU Foundation of Northern California, said Dignity’s appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court puts the lie to its statements about a devotion to serving everyone.
“For the first time in a long while, I can feel my heart begin to relax and a smile comes easily to my face,” Minton said Monday. “The words that instinctively run through my head are, ‘Thank God,’ and that is in all meanings of that expression. At the same time, it makes me angry that I’ve had to fight for basic rights, like the ability for transgender people, not to be turned away from care from our hospitals. And it’s felt like a slap in the face to see Dignity Health wage an advertising campaign, claiming that they are LGBTQ-inclusive, while fighting all the way to the Supreme Court for their right not to serve me.”
The Sacramento resident was diagnosed with gender dysphoria, a serious medical condition that results from a feeling of incongruence between one’s gender identity and one’s sex assigned at birth, according to his original filing in San Francisco Superior Court dated April 19, 2017. Minton was assigned the sex of female, the lawsuit stated, but identified as a male as he developed.
In Minton’s lawsuit, Gill noted there are widely accepted standards of care for treating gender dysphoria published by the World Professional Association for Transgender Health, saying the standards are recognized by leading medical organizations, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and federal courts.
His physicians recommended a series of treatments to help him transition and affirm his gender identity, records showed, and Minton underwent hormone replacement therapy in 2012 and a mastectomy in 2014. He planned to undergo the hysterectomy before undergoing the surgical creation of a penis.
Minton’s surgeon, Dr. Lindsey Dawson, scheduled the procedure on a day when she planned another hysterectomy at Mercy San Juan, court records stated, but two days before the surgery, Minton mentioned to a pre-operation nurse that he is transgender.
In an interview with The Bee in April 2017, Dawson said Dignity Health officials assisted her in getting emergency privileges at Methodist so she could perform the procedure there.
Dignity Health officials, on Monday, said: ‘We realize that people who are LGBTQ have faced significant and longstanding challenges getting the care they need from supportive and knowledgeable providers. We regret that Mr. Minton’s hysterectomy was incorrectly scheduled at one of our facilities that does not provide the service he needed. We realize how frustrating and disappointing it is for a patient to have a procedure rescheduled on short notice. Our team was able to quickly facilitate access for Mr. Minton’s procedure at a nearby provider three days later.’
Minton sued Mercy San Juan over the last-minute cancellation of his procedure, however, arguing that Mercy San Juan’s actions violated California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act, which says businesses must offer full and equal access to state residents.
A San Francisco Superior Court judge dismissed Minton’s lawsuit, saying the Carmichael-based hospital followed the direction of California Supreme Court justices in quickly rescheduling the procedure at a different facility. The superior court found this action fell in line with the high court’s decision in North Coast Women’s Care Medical Group Inc. v. San Diego County Superior Court.
Minton appealed, and Presiding Justice Stuart R. Pollak of 1st District Court of Appeal noted in his decision that: “Without determining the right of Dignity Health to provide its services in such cases at alternative facilities, as it claims to have done here, we agree that plaintiff’s complaint alleges that Dignity Health initially failed to do so and that its subsequent rectification of its denial, while likely mitigating plaintiff’s damages, did not extinguish his cause of action for discrimination.”
On Monday, Gill told The Bee that the decision means they can now sue over discrimination in the state trial court. She noted, though, that Pollak in his appeal court decision had stated that the denial of a procedure that treats a condition particular to transgender persons supports an inference that Dignity Health discriminated against Minton based on his gender identity.
This is true, Pollak noted, even if the denial was based upon a policy that does not appear discriminatory on its face. Justices Alison Tucher and Tracie L. Brown concurred on the opinion.
“While we may not be able to provide every needed service at every hospital—no hospital can—Dignity Health does provide a range of services that LGBTQ people value and rely on,” Dignity leaders said Monday. “For example, at many of our hospitals and clinics, we offer primary care and transgender health care services for transgender patients.”
Gill said: “The world has been a hostile place for for transgender Americans, and by contrast, Dignity Health here in California has really put itself out to the public — and also to California lawmakers — as wanting to be LGBTQ-inclusive. ... Then taking this case all the way to the Supreme Court to try to say, ‘we have a constitutional right to discriminate,’ is really at odds with that.”
Dignity Health said Monday: “In keeping with our Catholic faith, at our Catholic-sponsored care sites we do not offer certain services including sterilizing procedures such as hysterectomies to any patient regardless of gender identity, unless the patient has a life-threatening condition. Courts have long recognized the right of faith-based providers to offer services that are consistent with their religious beliefs. Although the Supreme Court will not consider this important issue at this time, we plan to continue to pursue the case at the lower-court level.”
This story was originally published November 1, 2021 at 9:49 AM.
