Today, the Justice Department and Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) entered an agreement, under Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), to resolve allegations that MGH denied a patient eligibility for a lung transplant because he was being treated with a prescription medication for opioid use disorder (OUD). The patient later received a lung transplant elsewhere. Under the two-year-agreement, MGH will implement a non-discrimination policy stating that it will not impose eligibility criteria that unnecessarily deny or limit treatment for individuals on the basis of disability (including OUD), provide ADA training to medical staff involved in decisions about transplants, and provide the complainant and his mother a total of $250,000 in monetary relief.
For more information about this agreement or the ADA, call the Department’s toll-free ADA Information Line at 800-514-0301 (TDD 800-514-0383) or access the ADA website at ada.gov.