Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 prohibits discrimination against the handicapped in any program receiving federal funds. With its implementing regulations, Section 504 may well apply to the selection of patients for medical treatments. This article examines patient selection for heart transplantation, in light of the Rehabilitation Act and its previous application in similar (but non-medical) contexts. With the growing need to allocate scarce medical resources comes a need to examine carefully the legal bounds for patient-selection procedures.
We review the workers' compensation laws with reference to the recognition of psychologists as diagnosticians of mental injuries and treatment providers for workers with work-related mental injuries. We show that with the exception of California, Florida, Hawaii, and the federal system, psychological services are not explicitly recognized as available to, nor are psychologists explicitly recognized as diagnosticians or treatment providers for, the mentally injured worker. The implications of these findings are discussed. KAREN J. MCRRIKIN received her JD from the University of Washington. She is Counsel to the Group Health Cooperative of Puget Sound in Seattle. THOMAS D. OVERCAST received his PhD and JD from the Law-Psychology Graduate Training Program at the University of Nebraska. He is now a consultant and in the private practice of law in
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