South Carolina Hospital Settles Case Involving Patient Dumping Allegation

On December 22, 2016, McLeod Medical Center (MMC), a small hospital located in Dillon, South Carolina, entered into a $20,000 settlement agreement with OIG. The settlement agreement resolves allegations that MMC violated the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act when it failed to provide an appropriate medical screening examination and stabilizing treatment of a patient who presented to MMC after being assaulted and hit in the head. The patient resisted efforts by his mother to get him into a wheelchair to enter the Emergency Department (ED). Security guards observed the patient's behavior and told the patient's mother that if she brought her son into the ED the guard would have him locked up. OIG alleges that the mother explained to the security guard that her son had been hit in the head and was bleeding and that a guard allegedly answered by reasserting that he would call the police if her son entered the ED. At that point the mother left with her son and later took him to another hospital for evaluation and treatment. Senior Counsel Sandra Sands represented OIG.

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