February 2, 2006
FOR IMMEDIATE
RELEASE
CONTACT:
media@aclu.org ALBUQUERQUE – The
American Civil Liberties Union of New Mexico today said it has secured an
agreement from the New Mexico Orthopaedic Surgery Center to stop making patients
sign away their right-to-die arrangements as a prerequisite for receiving
care.
“Patients should be in control of how they end their
lives, not companies that are simply trying to reduce insurance costs,” said
ACLU of New Mexico Executive Director Peter Simonson. “The Center tried to
claim it established the policy because of ‘reasons of conscience,’ but they
never produced any policy or mission statement to that effect. It was
pretty clear to us this was a business decision, not a moral
one.”
According to the agreement between the Center and the ACLU’s
plaintiff, Harold Folley, the company will delete a clause from its medical
procedures consent form that asked patients to acknowledge that the Center would
“not honor a request for ‘Do Not Resuscitate’ status and/or Advance Directives
or Living Wills.”
In addition to changing its medical
consent forms, the New Mexico Orthopaedic Surgical Center and a subsidiary
facility, the Las Cruces Surgical Center, agreed to post public notices of the
policy changes and distribute the revised form to all of their patients.
The main company, United Surgical Partners, Inc., also agreed to donate $5,000
to United Way of Central New Mexico and to pay the ACLU $1,700 in legal fess and
costs.
Folley, who receives periodic treatment from the Center for
a spinal condition, said: “I am extremely pleased with the outcome of the
suit. Many thousands of New Mexicans want to protect their living wills
and other advance directives, especially after witnessing the horrible Terry
Schiavo ordeal. This agreement will help at least some of them achieve that
goal. I respect the orthopedics center for joining with us in the
settlement, and I especially respect the ACLU for helping me in making this
possible. I certainly could not have done this without the
ACLU.”
