Clearly This Is A Good Thing...

[gonzai]

...by which I mean Obama's order to hospitals to follow patients' wishes as to who may visit them/have decision-making powers. It's the right thing, it's such a basic human right for all people. But...

...I can't help wondering, why in the hell were hospitals refusing to allow visitors/PoAs in the first place? I can't imagine why a hospital would have people there whose job it was just to say 'you can go in, you can't' or why they would refuse to honor a PoA or other directive. I can understand limiting the number of visitors, or blocking small children, but it flabbergasts me that a medical facility would decide who was or wasn't allowed to visit a patient. 

Comments

[jslinder.livejournal.com]

For insurance and crowd control reasons, most hospitals have a hard limit 'immediate family only' rule in areas like the ICU and others. Since same sex marriage is not recognized in most states, partners don't count as immediate family and therefore the hospital would not let them in (POAs don't count either).