Trying to order medications for a heart attack victim using electronic medical records, White Coat is frustrated to run into screen after screen preventing him from completing the order without addressing unlikely allergy issues (and thus protecting the hospital from liability):
For those of you who don’t know what alarm fatigue is, think of a car alarm. The first time you hear it going off, you run to your window to see who’s breaking into a car. Maybe you run to the window the second time and the third time, too. By the tenth time the alarm goes off, you’re thinking that the alarm is broken and someone needs to get that fixed. After about thirty false alarms, you’re feeling like going out there and busting up the car yourself – especially if the car alarm wakes you when you’re asleep.
It’s a concept with many applications beyond the emergency room setting, too, product warnings being just the start.
P.S. Dr. Westby Fisher has some related thoughts about the limits of trying to engineer physician responsibility through electronic records design.
Tagged as:
allergies,
emergency medicine,
overwarning,
pharmaceuticals
- Tel Aviv: “City Workers Paint Handicap Space Around Car, Then Tow It” [Lowering the Bar]
- Editorial writer has some generous comments about my work on excessive litigation. Thanks! [Investors Business Daily]
- Nuisance payment: Toyota will throw $29 million at state attorneys general who chased bogus sudden acceleration theory [Amanda Bronstad, NLJ]
- “Iowa Woman Who Didn’t Break Allergy Pill Limit Law Charged with Crime Anyway” [Shackford]
- Cutting outlays on the nonexistent census, and other bogus D.C. spending cuts: in the business world, they’d call it fraud [Coyote, Boaz] Skepticism please on the supposed national crumbling-infrastructure crisis [Jack Shafer]
- Tassel therapy: “Lawsuit Claims Dancing in a Topless Bar “Improves the Self Esteem” of the Stripper” [KEGL]
- Was there ever an economics textbook to beat Alchian and Allen? R.I.P. extraordinary economist Armen Alchian, whose microeconomics introductory course for grad students I was fortunate to take long ago [Cafe Hayek, David Henderson, more, more, more, Bainbridge]
Tagged as:
accolades,
allergies,
attorneys general,
strippers and exotic dancers,
Toyota,
traffic laws
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Lesley University in Cambridge, Mass. was in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act because it failed to
* Continually provide ready-made hot and cold gluten- and allergen-free food options in its dining hall food lines;
* Develop individualized meal plans for students with food allergies, and allow those students to pre-order allergen free meals, that can be made available at the university’s dining halls in Cambridge and Boston;
* Provide a dedicated space in its main dining hall to store and prepare gluten-free and allergen-free foods and to avoid cross-contamination;
And much more. The college has also agreed to pay $50,000 to students affected by its earlier policies. [J. Christian Adams] Similarly: Hans von Spakovsky, FoxNews.
P.S. NPR report confirms demand from advocates for “gluten-free food [that] is prepared and served in dedicated areas.”
Tagged as:
allergies,
colleges and universities,
disability & schools
In Clyde Hill, Wash., a retired Seattle Mariners baseball player has won a ruling from the town that his neighbors must remove two trees that block what would otherwise be an “amazing view of Seattle’s skyline” from his property. “An appraiser hired by John and Kelly Olerud said their $4 million home would be worth $255,000 more if the rare Chinese pine and the Colorado spruce across the street were cut down and replaced with smaller plants. The Chinese pine’s value is estimated at more than $18,000.” [Seattle Times, Ilya Somin] In other tree removal news, an Ontario mother “is fighting to have oak trees removed near her child’s school, fearing that acorns could pose a deadly threat to students with severe allergies.” Local officials say it is unlikely the acorns would prove allergenic to a child unless eaten, which rarely happens given their extreme bitterness. The mother also says acorns “can also be used to bully and torment children.” [Toronto Star via Lenore Skenazy]
Tagged as:
allergies,
bullying,
Canada,
property law,
Seattle,
trees
“A former city worker is suing Indianapolis after she claims the city failed to accommodate the service dog she needs due to her severe allergy to paprika.” The city had already removed certain foods from its vending machines but declined to accept a service dog as reasonable accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) because a co-worker was allergic to dogs. [WRTV]
Tagged as:
allergies,
disabled rights,
Indiana,
service animals
- ADA mills continue to extract money from California small businesses with no legislative relief in sight [Auburn Journal, Andrew Ross/S.F. Chronicle, KABC (James Farkus Cohan), WTSP (Squeeze Inn owner speaks out), CJAC (Lungren proposal) and more, Chamber (San Francisco coffee shop's woes, auto-plays video)] Profile of attorney Thomas Frankovich [California Lawyer];
- EEOC sues employer for turning away job applicant on methadone program [Jon Hyman]
- “Maryland high court: allergy is disability requiring accommodation” [PoL]
- “Suits could force L.A. to spend huge sums on sidewalk repair” [Los Angeles Times]
- Under gun from Department of Justice and SCOTUS Olmstead ruling, Virginia and other states agree to massive overhaul of services for developmentally disabled; not all families, though, are happy with the insistence on relocating residents of large facilities to smaller “community” settings [Richmond Times-Dispatch, McDonnell press release, Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, Staunton News-Leader]
- “New Case from W.D. Tex. Shows Effect of ADAAA on Back Injury Claims” [Disability Law]
- Lawyer leads effort to give disabled passengers wider rights to sue airlines [Toledo Free Press]
Tagged as:
ADA filing mills,
airlines,
allergies,
California,
disabled rights,
EEOC,
illegal drugs,
Los Angeles,
Maryland,
Virginia
Florida: “To protect the [6-year-old] girl [with a severe peanut allergy], students in her class at Edgewater Elementary School are required to wash their hands before entering the classroom in the morning and after lunch, and rinse out their mouths, [Volusia County school spokeswoman Nancy] Wait said, and a peanut-sniffing dog checked out the school during last week’s spring break.” [Reuters]
Tagged as:
allergies,
disabled rights,
Florida,
schools
- 1978 accident settlement: “Old check for $17,500 found in woman’s nightstand drawer” [Orlando Sentinel]
- John Tierney on the great dietary salt debate [N.Y. Times]
- U.K.: reports from chiropractor association libel case against Simon Singh [Jack of Kent, Index on Censorship, Crispian Jago, earlier here, here, here, etc.]
- Law firm marketers should employ Hitler videos with care, if at all [Greenfield] Another funny lawyer ad from NYC’s Trolman, Glaser & Lichtman [Lowering the Bar, earlier]
- Claim: to undo “blockages”, psychic needed $4,773 shopping spree at Ralph Lauren [N.Y. Daily News, h/t Siouxsie Law]
- First Amendment plaintiff wins $1,791, but Jefferson County, Colorado may be out a million in legal fees [Karen Crummy, Denver Post]
- Unanimous SCOTUS ruling could curb forum-shopping in suits against national businesses [Krauss, PoL, and more at roundup]
- Long Island: “Woman Sues ‘Babies ‘R’ Us’ Over Peanut Allergy” [WCBS]
Tagged as:
allergies,
attorneys' fees,
chasing clients,
forum shopping,
libel slander and defamation,
Long Island,
salt,
United Kingdom
This vital step in an allergy-mitigation protocol appears not to have been undertaken by Darius Dugger of Portsmouth, Va., who says he specifically asked that Burger King omit the onions, tomato and pickle from his sandwich, but that they ignored his request, resulting in the severe allergic reaction for which he’d like $100,000. [Norfolk Virginian-Pilot via Patrick at Popehat] He says he’d already taken a bite and swallowed by the time he realized their error, as opposed to, you know, peeking under the bun to see. Earlier on West Virginia McDonald’s “hold the cheese” suit here.
Tagged as:
allergies,
personal responsibility,
restaurants
“A group in Santa Fe says the city is discriminating against them because they say that they’re allergic to the wireless Internet signal. And now they want Wi-Fi banned from public buildings. … [Arthur] Firstenberg and dozens of other electro-sensitive people in Santa Fe claim that putting up Wi-Fi in public places is a violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act. The city attorney is now checking to see if putting up Wi-Fi could be considered discrimination. But City Councilor Ron Trujillo says the areas are already saturated with wireless Internet.” (Gadi Schwartz, KOB, May 20).
Tagged as:
allergies,
disabled rights,
environment,
New Mexico
This website is mentioned in an article on allergies and chemical sensitivities in the workplace, specifically on the case of Susan McBride, who’s suing her employer, the city of Detroit, for not preventing a co-worker from wearing perfume to the office (see Jul. 6 and Jul. 18, 2007; earlier Detroit case, May 25, 2005). (Lisa Belkin, “Sickened by the Office (Really)”, May 1).
Tagged as:
about the site,
allergies,
Detroit,
disabled rights,
environment
Kim Severson of the New York Times has this article on the growing interest among parents of food allergies:
Record numbers of parents are heading to doctors concerned that their children are allergic to a long list of foods. States are passing laws requiring schools to have policies protecting children with food allergies. But no one knows why the number of allergies seems to be on the rise, or even if they are rising as fast as some believe.
Ms. O’Brien and leading allergy researchers agree that few reliable studies on food allergies exist. The best estimates suggest that 4 to 8 percent of young children suffer from them, though the reactions tend to grow less serious and less frequent as children grow older.
Even though the science is weak, new laws and policies are enacted under the banner of child safety. Yet as David Bernstein points out, we’ve been down this road before.
Tagged as:
allergies,
child protection,
medical,
schools
The U.S. Chamber-affiliated West Virginia Record has some further details on, as well as a selection of media reaction to, the $10 million lawsuit by Jeromy Jackson of Morgantown charging that the burger chain put cheese on his Quarter Pounder despite his requests, thus triggering an allergic reaction. (Cara Bailey, “‘Hold the cheese’ suit draws worldwide attention”, Aug. 17). Earlier: Aug. 10.
Tagged as:
allergies,
restaurants,
West Virginia
Jeromy Jackson says he repeatedly told the McDonald’s in Morgantown, W.V. that he needed his two Quarter Pounders without cheese, because he was allergic to cheese; “From this point forward, Mr. Jackson repeatedly asked as to the status of his food and whether it had no cheese, and took multiple preventive steps to assure his food did not contain cheese,” his suit says. On biting into the sandwich, his suit alleges, he suffered a severe allergic reaction and had to be rushed to a hospital (Cara Bailey, “Man allergic to cheese seeks $10 million from McDonald’s”, West Virginia Record, Aug. 8).
James Taranto is not what you would call sympathetic toward the action (Aug. 9): “So apparently the ‘multiple preventive steps’ he took ‘to assure his food did not contain cheese’ did not include looking at the damn sandwich before eating it”.
Tagged as:
allergies,
hospitals,
McDonald's,
West Virginia
