An appeals court has sided with Ohio State University over a former employee who claimed that she was demoted and then fired from her managerial position in an OSU hospital's operating room because of her race.
In a racial discrimination lawsuit against the university, Katrina Brown, RN, claimed that her white supervisors at OSU Medical Center East demoted her from director of perioperative services to nurse manager in December 2005 and then terminated her employment in July 2006 because she is black.
Court documents from the case indicate that Ms. Brown had been successful as associate director of perioperative services at the hospital from July 2001 to January 2004, but that Administrative Director of Nursing Services Jerry Mansfield began expressing concerns about her performance as director of perioperative services 8 months after he promoted her to that role.
Among the "areas of concern" Mr. Mansfield expressed in Ms. Brown's August 2004 and August 2005 performance reviews were materials management, waiting time, communication and decision-making skills and her "confusing and reactive" interactions with administrators, staff and surgeons. The two worked on an action plan to address the areas of concern, but after reviewing the plan and Ms. Brown's subsequent performance, Mr. Mansfield "concluded that some of Brown's goals had not been met," and he demoted her to nurse manager in December 2005.
Six months later, Ms. Brown's replacement as director of perioperative services, Denise Minor, expressed concerns about Ms. Brown's performance in the nurse manager role, including her alleged confrontational communication style and disinterest in discussing or addressing such problems, according to court documents.
Ms. Brown first brought up her concerns about potential discrimination in a meeting with Ms. Minor and Mr. Mansfield on June 21, 2006, when the three met to discuss her performance as nurse manager. Court documents state that in deposition testimony, Ms. Brown said she told Mr. Mansfield that she couldn't "seem to establish a relationship" with him and asked him, "Is it because I'm African-American or what?" Mr. Mansfield, Ms. Minor and Ms. Brown discussed another action plan; Ms. Brown later testified she didn't agree with the plan, though she didn't express that to her superiors at the time.
Mr. Mansfield identified further communication and decision-making problems in subsequent dealings with Ms. Brown, and on July 31, 2006, she was presented with a letter specifying the grounds for her termination, which included "deterioration of day-to-day decision-making and lack of personal ownership," and her lack of response to supervisors' concerns, according to court documents.
Ms. Brown filed her racial discrimination complaint in May 2007. Both the district court and the appeals judges ultimately sided with Ohio State, finding that Ms. Brown's argument did "nothing to address the reasons actually advanced for her demotion and termination" and "that Brown had failed to show that the Caucasian Nurse Managers she worked with responded to problems identified by their supervisors in the same manner that she did."
Lawyers for Ms. Brown and Ohio State did not return calls for comment.
Irene Tsikitas
