O'Donnell v. Univ. Hosps. Health Sys.
| Decision Date | 03 April 2018 |
| Docket Number | CASE NO.: 1:16 CV 2480 |
| Parties | Alison O'Donnell, Plaintiff, v. University Hospitals Health System, et al., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Ohio |
MEMORANDUM OPINION
This matter is before the Court on the Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment. (ECF #25). For the reasons that follow, Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment is granted.
Plaintiff Alison O'Donnell brings this action against Defendants University Hospitals Health System ("UH"), Dr. Naveen Uli, Dr. Sumana Narasimhan, Dr. Rose Gubitosi-Klug and William Rebello alleging claims of Failure to Accommodate in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA"), 42 U.S.C. § 12112 et seq., (Count I); Disability Discrimination in violation of the ADA (Count II); Retaliation based on Disability Discrimination in violation of the ADA (Count III); Race Discrimination in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 ("Title VII"), 42 U.S.C. § 2000e et seq., (Count IV); Retaliation based on Race Discrimination in violation of Title VII (Count V); Disability Discrimination in violation of OhioRev. Code § 4112 (Count VI); Retaliation based on Disability Discrimination in violation of §4112 (Count VII); Race Discrimination in violation of §4112 (Count VIII); Retaliation based on Race Discrimination in violation of §4112 (Count IX) and Aiding and Abetting in violation of §4112.02(J) against Defendant Rebello.2
Plaintiff is an African American physician. She entered U.H's three year fellowship in Pediatric Endocrinology on June 1, 2010. (Compl. ¶¶ 28-30) The Fellowship Program trains physicians for academic-related careers in Endocrinology and gives licensed physicians the opportunity to become board-certified pediatric endocrinologists. (Plaintiff's Aff. ¶1) Only two applicants are accepted into the Fellowship Program each year, and in general, six fellows are in the Program at any one time.(Plaintiff's Dep. p. 69) During Plaintiff's time in the Fellowship program, Dr. O'Donnell was the only African American in the program, while the rest of the fellows were Indian, Asian and Caucasian.
At the time that Plaintiff was admitted to the Fellowship Program, the Program was run by seven UH faculty members including the three remaining individual defendants. In order to successfully complete the Fellowship Program, the physicians who run the Fellowship Program, including the individual defendants, have to certify that the fellows completed the requirements of the program, which are national standards. All fellows must meet those standards in order to complete the Fellowship Program. (Plaintiff's Dep. p. 63-65) The seven faculty members work closely with the fellows as teachers and in overseeing patient care. (Plaintiff's Dep. p. 70-71) In addition, the faculty members conduct annual performance evaluations and advise fellows whenperformance issues arise. (Plaintiff Dep. Ex. 12) There is a long list of expectations that fellows are expected to meet including treating patients, consulting with other pediatric physicians on Endocrinology issues, self-education of assigned topics, attending and participating in educational and administrative meetings and research. (See Plaintiff Dep. Ex. 5).
In June of 2011, following Plaintiff's first year in the Fellowship Program, Plaintiff was advised that she had serious performance issues and was given a Remediation Plan. (Plaintiff Dep. Ex. 11) The Remediation Plan detailed the deficiencies in Plaintiff's performance noted by seven faculty members for the period from January through June 2011 along with seven steps that Plaintiff should take to remediate her performance issues. The Remediation Plan was signed by Dr. Uli and Plaintiff on August 9, 2011. The copy of the Plan, attached as Exhibit 11 to Plaintiff's deposition, has notes apparently added by Plaintiff which state her issues with the fairness of her evaluation and her position that she will not accept any penalties or restrictions being placed upon her as she feels that she has been "wrongfully accused and in general have been mistreated by this program." (Id.)
Before she began the Fellowship Program, Plaintiff was diagnosed with social anxiety disorder and social phobia by Dr. Francoise Adan, her treating psychiatrist, on July 2, 2009. Plaintiff was treated intermittently by Dr. Adan from July 2009 through January, 2013 and was prescribed anxiety medications Lexapro and Klonopin. Plaintiff experienced "physical symptoms of anxiety around social situations, heart racing, sweating, speaking fast, poor concentration, mind going blank and jittery." (Adan Dep. p 22) Plaintiff's disorder impacted both her personal and professional life. (Id. at p 27) While treating with Dr. Adan, Plaintiff began counseling with Dr. Paul Minnillo, a UH staff psychologist. Dr. Minnillo testified that Plaintiff's anxiety disorderwas "very pervasive, very profound." (Minnillo Dep. p. 35) Plaintiff states that early in her fellowship she disclosed her social anxiety disorder to Dr. Uli. (Plaintiff Aff. ¶ 3) Dr. Uli said that at the time he met with Plaintiff about the Remediation Plan, she had not disclosed that she had been diagnosed with a social anxiety disorder but had mentioned that she had social anxiety and that her innate shyness and social anxiety as well as her cultural upbringing prevented her from speaking out of turn. (Uli Dep. p. 111)
Plaintiff states that after she disclosed to Dr. Uli that she suffered from social anxiety disorder she was treated differently from other fellows. Plaintiff contends that the different treatment included receiving less time for orientation than other fellows; being assigned a presentation without prep time; being forced to complete work while on a pre-excused vacation day; being forced to see patients who were over an hour late to appointments despite protocol to have patient reschedule; being referred to by Dr. Narasimhan by her first name in front of patients instead of Dr. Mathews3; given clinical assignments with less notice than other fellows; being required to directly reschedule patient appointments; being accused of not writing patient notes or charts timely or thoroughly when Plaintiff's notes were more detailed than notes provided by Dr. Uli; and her ideas from research project were rejected and she was advised to work with another fellow on her project. (Plaintiff Aff. ¶¶ 4-16)
On September 29, 2011, Plaintiff sent a letter to Dr. Uli complaining about unspecified transgressions against Plaintiff by Dr. Uli and the Fellowship program and threatened to take the matter to higher authorities if a work environment free from harassment, fear of retaliation and undue stress was not provided for her. (Uli Dep. Ex. 29) Apparently not satisfied with Dr. Uli'sresponse, in October 2011 Plaintiff complained of disparate treatment to William Rebello, the manager of graduate medical education. (Plaintiff's Aff. ¶ 17) Plaintiff states that she complained a second time to Mr. Rebello and gave him a written summary of the disparate treatment taken against her. (Id. at ¶ 18; ECF #31-6) She told Mr. Rebello that she believed she was being discriminated against based on her race and mentioned her social anxiety disorder. (Rebello Dep. p. 27-28.) Mr. Rebello referred Plaintiff to the human resources department and also to Dr. Jerry Shuck, the head of the Graduate Medical Education Department. (Plaintiff's Dep. p. 117)
On February 11, 2012, Plaintiff sent an email to Claudia Hoyen, in UH's human resources office, with a copy to Mr. Rebello stating that she was concerned that the Fellowship program was not complying with her Remediation Plan as she was not receiving a monthly evaluation and immediate feedback. She stated that she felt that the program was trying to make it so unpleasant for her that she would leave. (Uli Dep. Ex. 31) Ms. Chester from human resources testified that she met several times with Plaintiff to discuss her concerns with her treatment by Program faculty and that she or others in the human resources department investigated all of Plaintiff's complaints and determined that none of them were substantiated. (Chester Dep. pp. 106-109).
Plaintiff sent an email to the faculty of the program on February 12, 2012, stating that it had come to her attention that the faculty wanted her to speak more during Wednesday conferences and were interpreting her silence as ignorance. She told them that her In addition she told them that she planned to make more than the required number of presentations and hoped that this compromisewould suit everyone's needs. (Uli Dep. Ex. 32)
The program faculty determined that Plaintiff's progress was deficient and in late February 2012, Plaintiff was given a Performance Alert Notice because her performance was identified as marginal or unsatisfactory. The performance alert identified deficiencies in patient care, medical knowledge, practice based learning and improvement, interpersonal and communication skills, professionalism and failure to obtain certification in general pediatrics. While the faculty noted the effort that Plaintiff had been putting in, with improvement in her knowledge base, the consensus was that she was not performing at the level expected of a second year fellow and recommended that her fellowship be extended by 12 months to allow adequate time for Plaintiff to develop the mandatory core competencies required for sub-specialty certification. (Plaintiff's Dep. p. 180, Ex. 13) In a note written on the bottom of Exhibit 13 dated February 29, 2012, Dr. Uli states that he discussed the performance alert with Plaintiff and after reviewing its contents, she refused to sign it. She told him she would...
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