A viral video has brought national attention to the hospital practice known as "patient dumping," in which hospitals discharge patients who may not have anywhere to go, regardless of their state of health.
The video shows a confused woman with cuts on her face being left at a bus stop in front of the University of Maryland Medical Center Midtown Campus in Baltimore by hospital staff in freezing temperatures wearing nothing but a hospital gown.
Art Caplan, the director of The Division of Medical Ethics at the NYU Langone Medical Center, told Boston Public Radio Wednesday that patient dumping can happen when the ER is overwhelmed, a patient has no money, or is mentally ill and troublesome for the hospital to handle.
While this practice has been reported at hospitals across the country, it is illegal.
“There is a federal law that basically says you have to take people into emergency rooms and you have to have a discharge plan," Caplan explained. "It can be you’re going to the shelter, you’re going to the halfway house, here are some clothes, that kind of thing.”
Caplan said that the extent to which hospitals discharge their patients this way is unknown as it usually happens at night and goes unreported. While the Baltimore hospital is conducting an investigation into the patient’s discharge, Caplan pointed out that when there are reports of patient dumping, hospitals still rarely receive punishment.
“The Inspector General of Health and Human Services [is] in charge of enforcing this law. It looks like they examined 200 cases, 3 percent of the hospitals got a fine or punishment,” he said.
Caplan blames this practice on the callousness of health care providers and the systemic hurdles homeless and mentally ill people face.
"It is our fault,” he said. “We have homeless and mentally ill [people] all over the place and we aren’t doing anything about it. We aren’t fixing the problem.”
To listen to the entire interview with Art Caplan, click on the audio player above.
