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The Critical Condition Of The Emergency Medical Treatment And Active Labor Act: A Proposed Amendment To The Act After "In The Matter Of Baby K", Scott B. Smith

Vanderbilt Law Review

Congress enacted the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act ('EMTALA" or "the Act") in 1986 to prevent hospi- tals from "dumping" patients due to an improper economic motive. Patient dumping occurs when a hospital emergency room either refuses to admit an indigent and uninsured patient with an emergency condition or improperly transfers this patient to another hospital. Congress enacted EMTALA in response to the widespread practice of hospitals dumping indigent and uninsured patients. Yet despite the Act's explicit legislative intent to prevent patient dumping, the language of EMTALA extends protection to "any individual" who enters a hospital's emergency room. …