Ervine v. Desert View Regional Medical Center Holdings, LLC

We are presented with claims under the Rehabilitation Act against health care providers for failure to communicate effectively with a person who is deaf.

I

Charlene Ervine, who was deaf, died of cancer in November 2009. In the years before her death, she sought treatment at Desert View Regional Medical Center, a hospital serving Pahrump, Nevada, and from Dr. Georges Tannoury, a practitioner who owned Specialty Medical Center in that town. Her husband, Sie Ervine, who is also deaf, accompanied her on many of her medical visits. Both Mr. and Mrs. Ervine communicated primarily through American Sign Language.

Mr. Ervine contends that Desert View and Dr. Tannoury on several occasions failed to take the steps necessary to communicate effectively with the Ervines about Mrs. Ervine’s treatment. Specifically, neither provided the Ervines with an interpreter during their visits and neither was prepared to provide an interpreter when necessary.

According to Mr. Ervine, Desert View had refused to provide a sign-language interpreter from the first time Mrs. Ervine visited the hospital, in August 2007. As to Dr. Tannoury, Mrs. Ervine reported — as early as April 2008 — to the…