California Open to Resolving Suit Against Catholic Hospital Over Emergency Abortion Care

The state’s Department of Justice on Wednesday appeared to suggest it was open to settling its lawsuit against a Catholic hospital in Northern California accused of denying a pregnant woman emergency abortion care.

Attorney General Rob Bonta announced the lawsuit on Monday, alleging that policy at Providence St. Joseph Hospital in Eureka prevented doctors from performing a potentially life-saving emergency abortion on Dr. Anna Nusslock, who was 15 weeks pregnant with twins when her water broke, so long as “fetal heart tones” were present.

Garry Olney, chief executive for Providence’s Northern California service area, apologized in a statement to employees, saying Nusslock’s treatment did not meet Providence’s “high standards for safe, quality, compassionate care.” A spokesperson pointed to the Catholic Church’s U.S. health care directives that allow for “operations, treatments, and medications that have as their direct purpose the cure of a proportionately serious pathological condition of a pregnant woman” that cannot be safely postponed until the child is viable, “even if they will result in the death of the unborn child.”

“We are immediately revisiting our training, education and escalation processes in emergency medical situations to ensure that this does not happen again and to ensure that our care teams have the training and support they need to deliver the best possible care for each patient we serve,” Olney’s message reads.

The hospital did not clarify whether it has a policy that bans medical intervention when a fetal heartbeat can be detected unless the patient’s life is sufficiently at risk. According to the lawsuit, a doctor at Providence St. Joseph told Nusslock that she could not perform an in-clinic abortion procedure known as dilation and evacuation unless Nusslock’s life was at risk, nor could she induce contractions with misoprostol while the fetuses still had a heartbeat.

“If Providence is committed to changing its policies to comply with the law and ensuring this never happens again, our office is prepared to work constructively with them to resolve this litigation and to protect patients,” a spokesperson for the California Department of Justice said.

According to the lawsuit, Nusslock was experiencing contractions and bleeding and was told that her twins would not survive — and that her health would also be at risk if she did not receive an emergency abortion. But a Providence St. Joseph doctor, the suit alleges, told Nusslock the only care she could provide was expectant management or closely monitoring her symptoms for changes that would allow intervention. She suggested that Nusslock travel to another hospital to receive care.

Nusslock ultimately drove — with towels and buckets, “in case something happen[ed] in the car” — to Mad River Community Hospital 12 miles away in Arcata, where a doctor performed an emergency abortion. They said Nusslock was “actively hemorrhaging” on the operating table.

The suit claims that though Providence “will ostensibly intervene” if a pregnant patient is “on the verge of death,” California law requires that, as a licensed facility, it must act in the event of serious injury or illness as well. It also alleges that Providence discriminates against pregnant patients by not giving them comprehensive emergency care as it would others.

The attorney general’s office said it believes that others might have had experiences similar to Nusslock, and is asking that they share their experiences with the Department of Justice.

“We don’t yet know the full scope of this problem or how many patients have suffered, but we do know that unless we act, this will happen again and again,” Bonta said.

He asked the court to issue an injunction prohibiting the hospital and its affiliates from violating the state laws it says required them to provide Nusslock with care, along with requiring them to pay monetary damages.

“Even in California, a champion for reproductive freedom, we are not immune from practices like the one we’re seeing today, and we will not stand by as it occurs,” Bonta said during a press conference on Monday. “We will take action as we’re doing today and move to end it immediately.”

KQED’s Carly Severn contributed to this report.