The Health and Human Services Department finalized a rule that broadens nondiscrimination protections for individuals with disabilities in healthcare environments.
The regulation mandates a series of actions to be taken by healthcare providers that the HHS Office for Civil Rights, which promulgated the regulation, believes will improve medical treatments for people with disabilities.
Related: New HHS disability access rule to bring big change to healthcare
When the rule takes effect July 1, healthcare organizations will be required to modify facilities and medical equipment to cater to patients' physical and sensory needs. Facilities will have to update features such as elevators and ramps to ensure they are functional and meet federal standards. Medical equipment such as examination tables, scales and mammogram machines will need modifications to accommodate patients using wheelchairs or will need to be replaced.
In addition, healthcare organizations must ensure websites, mobile apps and virtual care programs are user-friendly for people with disabilities and remove disability status as a factor in clinical support tools.
“By removing barriers to health care and social services, this rule advances justice for people with disabilities who have for too long been subject to discrimination,” HHS OCR Director Melanie Fontes Rainer said in a release. “No diagnosis should be missed because of an inaccessible mammogram, no patient should be left with questions about test results due to inaccessible websites, and no life should be valued less due to disability.”
The rule is the first update to Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 since 2005. The proposal aims to harmonize that law with the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act of 2010.
