Justice Department Secures Settlement Agreement with the Indiana State Nursing Board Addressing Discrimination Against People with Opioid Use Disorder

The Justice Division introduced in the present day that it has entered right into a settlement settlement with the Indiana State Board of Nursing (Nursing Board) to resolve claims it violated Title II of the People with Disabilities Act (ADA). The settlement settlement ensures that nurses who take remedy to deal with opioid use dysfunction (OUD) can stay on their remedy when collaborating within the Indiana State Nursing Help Program. This system assists in rehabilitating and monitoring nurses with substance use issues, and is usually required for these nurses to take care of an lively license or have one reinstated. The division beforehand notified the Nursing Board of its findings, and described the remedial measures crucial for the Nursing Board to handle the ADA violation recognized. This case was dealt with collectively by the Incapacity Rights Part of the Civil Rights Division and the U.S. Lawyer’s Workplace for the Southern District of Indiana.

“Indiana could not deny people life-saving medicines, together with medicines that deal with opioid use dysfunction, primarily based on stereotypes and misinformation,” mentioned Assistant Lawyer Common Kristen Clarke of the Justice Division’s Civil Rights Division. “Requiring nurses to cease taking prescribed remedy as a situation of sustaining a nursing license violates the ADA, and never solely creates obstacles to restoration, however inappropriately limits employment alternatives primarily based on incapacity.”

“The opioid epidemic has tremendously impacted professionals and households of all walks of life, and Indiana nurses have the correct to hunt medically authorized remedy for opioid use dysfunction below federal regulation,” mentioned U.S. Lawyer Zachary A. Myers for the Southern District of Indiana. “Following the Justice Division’s findings and the events’ settlement settlement, Indiana should now enact insurance policies to make sure that Hoosier nurses won’t be compelled to decide on between their restoration and their livelihoods.”

Underneath the phrases of the settlement, the Nursing Board will enable nurses to take part within the states’ rehabilitation program whereas taking remedy, together with remedy to deal with OUD, when the remedy is prescribed by a licensed practitioner as a part of a medically crucial remedy plan and included right into a restoration monitoring settlement. As well as, the Nursing Board has agreed to revise its written polices to make sure that nurses taking prescribed medicines for OUD should not subjected to discriminatory situations or phrases. The Nursing Board has additionally agreed to pay a complete of $70,000 in damages to the complainant, and to report periodically on its compliance to the US.

Methadone and buprenorphine (together with model names Subutex and Suboxone) are authorized by the Meals and Drug Administration to deal with OUD. In response to the U.S. Nationwide Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), methadone and buprenorphine assist diminish the results of bodily dependency on opioids. When taken as prescribed, these medicines are protected and efficient.

The Civil Rights Division, along with U.S. Attorneys’ places of work, has been working to take away discriminatory obstacles to restoration for people who’ve accomplished, or are collaborating in, remedy for OUD. By means of outreach, technical help and enforcement below the ADA, the Civil Rights Division seeks to make sure that these in remedy or restoration can efficiently take part of their communities and the workforce. For instance:

• On April 5, 2022, the division issued steering on protections for individuals with OUD below the ADA.
• On March 24, 2022, the division entered right into a settlement settlement with the Massachusetts Trial Courtroom to resolve allegations that its drug court docket violated the ADA by discriminating in opposition to people with OUD.
• On March 17, 2022, the division entered right into a settlement settlement with Able to Work, a Colorado-based employment, residential and social providers program for people experiencing homelessness, resolving allegations that this system denied admission to a person as a result of she takes remedy for OUD.
• On Feb. 24, 2022, the division filed a lawsuit in opposition to the Unified Judicial System of Pennsylvania, alleging that it prohibits or in any other case limits members in its court docket supervision applications from utilizing remedy to deal with OUD.

For extra data on the ADA, please name the division’s toll-free ADA data line at 1-800-514-0301 (TDD 800-514-0383) or go to www.ada.gov. For extra data on the Civil Rights Division, please go to www.justice.gov/crt. Complaints about disability-based discrimination could also be reported to the Civil Rights Division via the web reporting portal at https://civilrights.justice.gov/.