Heilweil v. Mount Sinai Hosp.
| Decision Date | 17 August 1994 |
| Docket Number | No. 1139,D,1139 |
| Citation | 32 F.3d 718 |
| Parties | , 3 A.D. Cases 964, 6 A.D.D. 448, 5 NDLR P 255 Donna HEILWEIL, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. MOUNT SINAI HOSPITAL, Defendant-Appellee. ocket 93-7881. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
Denny Chin, New York City (Anne L. Clark, Vladeck, Waldman, Elias & Engelhard, P.C., of counsel), for plaintiff-appellant Donna Heilweil.
Aaron J. Schindel, New York City (Seth Michael Popper, Proskauer Rose Goetz & Mendelsohn, of counsel), for defendant-appellee Mount Sinai Hosp.
Before: TIMBERS, CARDAMONE and WINTER, Circuit Judges.
Plaintiff, Donna Heilweil, appeals from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Owen, J.) entered August 5, 1993, granting defendant Mount Sinai Hospital's motion for summary judgment and dismissing plaintiff's complaint that alleged she was demoted and discharged in violation of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, as amended, 29 U.S.C. Secs. 701-796 (Act), Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, as amended, 42 U.S.C. 2000e to 2000e-17 (Title VII), and common law claims alleging an unsafe work environment and breach of contract.
The issue on this appeal is whether plaintiff, an asthmatic, is a handicapped person under the Rehabilitation Act so that her employer's decision to terminate her subjects it to liability for damages. Plaintiff held the position of administrator in the blood bank of the hospital where she worked. Located in the basement of one of the hospital's buildings, that facility's ventilating system made plaintiff's asthma much worse. Her discharge came after she informed her supervisor that her doctor told her she should no longer work there. But the inability to satisfy the requirements of a particular assignment does not mean such a person is regarded as handicapped. Such inability does not constitute the necessary substantial limitation of a "major life activity" required to meet the definition of a handicapped person under the Act. To meet that definition, the employee's impairment must limit her employment generally.
Plaintiff Donna Heilweil began working for defendant Mount Sinai Hospital (Mount Sinai or the hospital) as a Pavilion Manager in May 1987. Prior to being hired, she had been diagnosed as having asthma. Although this condition had caused her discomfort, she was able, with proper care and adjustment of her activities including regular exercise, to avoid discomfort and maintain her health. After Heilweil began working, she says she noticed a reduction in her capacity for exercise The blood bank contains offices, labs and patient care facilities. Because it has no windows, a forced air system provides it with ventilation. Heilweil complained to her superiors that when heating oil was delivered to the building, the ventilation system picked up the diesel fumes and circulated them into the blood bank. She also complained that natural gas fumes entered the office from an adjacent meter room, odors from soiled hospital linens emanated from a laundry chute that opened into a closet in the blood bank, and temperatures within the blood bank fluctuated widely. Plaintiff brought these matters to the attention of the hospital's Director of Institutional Safety Programs, Dr. Raymond Pfleger, and the former Medical Director of the blood bank, Dr. Greenberg. She told Dr. Greenberg that exposure to the blood bank's environment was causing her health problems.
began to cough and wheeze, and experienced sinus headaches. Her physician believed her symptoms were primarily caused by allergic reactions to her house cats and treated her for this with some success. Six months later she was promoted to the position of Management Associate. She was given responsibility for administrating the hospital's blood bank in April 1988 on a temporary basis, and eight months later in January 1989 this assignment became permanent. As administrator of the blood bank, she was in charge of supervising a $12 million dollar budget and 50 employees. In addition, she acted as a liaison between the blood bank and the hospital administration. Except for a small amount of time spent in the hematology department, Heilweil spent most of her working day in the blood bank. The hospital never expressed any dissatisfaction with her performance. To the contrary, Heilweil states she was repeatedly told by the administration that her work was outstanding.
In her complaint, plaintiff alleges that after her transfer to the blood bank her asthmatic symptoms worsened. There, she says, she began suffering physical and mental discomfort, including difficulty breathing, wheezing and coughing, respiratory infections, bronchitis, headaches, tightness in the chest, depression, and difficulty sleeping. Heilweil's physician advised her in March 1989 that the air quality at the blood bank was an "asthmatics's nightmare," the principal cause of her ailments, and that she should stay away from that facility.
Immediately after receiving her physician's diagnosis that the blood bank was the cause of her discomfort, Heilweil discussed her health concerns with her immediate supervisor, Joel Seligman, Associate Director of the hospital. Although the parties disagree as to precisely what was said, it is undisputed that because of her physical reaction to that facility's environment, Heilweil was no longer expected to work there on a regular basis. At this meeting Seligman told her that a new Medical Director of the blood bank was coming on June 1, 1989 and asked her in the interim not to seek other employment outside or within Mount Sinai, but rather to continue in her work and to assist in the transition. She would then be allowed time to find a new job, and Seligman told her he would assist her in finding a position at Mount Sinai or another hospital. Mount Sinai agrees with Heilweil's description of what transpired between her and Seligman only adding that Seligman told her if she was unable to work in the blood bank, she could not hold the position of administrator of that facility on a long-term basis. For the next several months, Heilweil never entered the blood bank; as she administered it from outside. Plaintiff maintains her health rapidly improved once this change in her work routine occurred.
On June 1, 1989 the new Medical Director of the blood bank arrived. The following day, Seligman asked Heilweil if she could go to the blood bank on a regular basis to meet with him. Heilweil refused, explaining that she felt ill very shortly after going into the blood bank and that she was then pregnant and was concerned for her baby's health. It became apparent to Seligman that Heilweil could not serve in her administrator capacity and he would need to find a replacement. Later that month Seligman informed Heilweil that a person already on staff would take over the functions of blood bank administrator and that Heilweil would serve as her Although Seligman had asked plaintiff at the June 1989 meeting to provide him with medical documentation regarding her asthmatic condition, she never did. In fact, the first medical documents Mount Sinai received were physician's records attached to Heilweil's affidavit in opposition to Mount Sinai's motion for summary judgment. These documents were filed in November 1992, more than three years after Mount Sinai requested this information. The records indicate that after March 1991 Heilweil's medical condition deteriorated to a point requiring surgical correction and that she may have developed a condition known as bronchiectasis, a change in the lining of the lung that renders it more sensitive and susceptible to fluid infiltration and infection.
assistant until sometime in August. Heilweil was discharged on August 25, 1989.
In her complaint Heilweil claimed she was demoted and discharged in violation of the Rehabilitation Act, because she was then an individual with handicaps under the Act and Mount Sinai refused to reasonably accommodate her, that her pregnant condition caused her demotion and discharge, in violation of Title VII, and that Mount Sinai failed to provide her with a safe place to work. She also alleged two breach of contract causes of action. In her prayer for relief, plaintiff sought a declaration of her rights, an injunction, reinstatement, reasonable accommodation of her impairment, compensatory and punitive damages, attorney's fees, costs and interest.
On September 28, 1992 Mount Sinai moved for summary judgment on all plaintiff's claims. Heilweil did not oppose defendant's motion on the two breach of contract actions. In a memorandum and order filed August 3, 1993, the district court granted summary judgment on her Rehabilitation Act and pregnancy discrimination causes of action, and dismissed her common law claim against the hospital for failing to provide a safe work environment, deferring to the jurisdiction of the New York Workers' Compensation Board. Judgment was entered in favor of Mount Sinai on August 5, 1993. From this grant of summary judgment plaintiff appeals.
On appeal Heilweil raises only two issues: the dismissal of her cause of action under the Rehabilitation Act and the dismissal of her common law safe workplace cause of action. We deal with each in turn.
The district court found that in June 1989--the relevant time--Heilweil was not a handicapped person within the meaning of the Act because her respiratory problems were exacerbated only when she worked in the blood bank and thus her medical condition did not substantially limit one or more of her life activities. The trial court based its conclusion on Heilweil's statement that she felt "fine now that I haven't been in the blood bank for several months" and that she had been exercising regularly. Because Judge Owen ruled that plaintiff was not a handicapped person, he did not reach or discuss the other...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Suttles v. US Postal Service
...of these elements in order to establish a prima facie case of discrimination under the Rehabilitation Act. See Heilweil v. Mount Sinai Hosp., 32 F.3d 718, 722 (2d Cir.1994), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 115 S.Ct. 1095, 130 L.Ed.2d 1063 It is readily apparent that Suttles' job with the Postal......
-
Boyce v. New York City Mission Soc.
...that disqualifies a person from only a narrow range of jobs is not considered a substantially limiting one." Heilweil v. Mount Sinai Hosp., 32 F.3d 718, 723 (2d Cir.1994), cert. denied, 513 U.S. 1147, 115 S.Ct. 1095, 130 L.Ed.2d 1063 There are three factors to consider when determining whet......
-
Muller v. Hotsy Corp.
...a person from only a narrow range of jobs is not considered a substantially limiting one." Id. (quoting Heilweil v. Mount Sinai Hosp., 32 F.3d 718, 723 (2d Cir.1994), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 115 S.Ct. 1095, 130 L.Ed.2d 1063 (1995)); see also Jasany v. United States Postal Serv., 755 F.2......
-
Soileau v. Guilford of Maine, Inc., Civil No. 95-162-B.
...944 (evidence showing inability to perform certain physical jobs failed to establish inability to work generally); Heilweil v. Mt. Sinai Hosp., 32 F.3d 718, 723 (2d Cir.1994) (that blood bank director could not work in blood bank did not establish evidence that the plaintiff was unable to w......
-
Deposing & examining the labor market expert
...raised material issue of fact because of her limited education, training, and employment background); Heilweil v. Mount Sinai Hospital, 32 F.3d 718, 724 (2d Cir. 1994) (finding plaintiff not hindered in her ability to work because of her advanced educational degrees). It is clearly beyond t......