Former Pennsylvania nurse claims medical center fired her over age discrimination

A federal judge approved a former Wynnewood, Pa.-based Lankenau Medical Center nurse's lawsuit against the facility, which claims the medical center fired her because of her age and not because she disregarded orders, according to philly.com.

According to the lawsuit, in November 2014, an unnamed patient asked Ms. Connearney to order buffalo wings. Ms. Connearney claims she received verbal approval to place the order from two on-duty physicians.

Ms. Connearney claims the night supervisor questioned her about the incident and subsequently emailed her supervisor, nurse Kathleen Hogan. His action prompted Ms. Connearney to write on the patient's record she received verbal approval to order the food.

Ms. Hogan reportedly terminated Ms. Connearney's employment for falsifying information on a patient medical record. The suit claims Ms. Connearney was actually fired due to her age, not because of buffalo wing dispute.

In his opinion, U.S. District Judge Gerald Pappert denied Main Line Health's motion to dismiss the lawsuit. He concluded that Ms. Hogan and the health system's "purported reason for terminating [Ms.] Connearney is not that she ordered buffalo wings for a patient, but that she falsified records about the food." He also stated that based on the second attending physician's testimony, "[Ms.] Hogan had some other issues with [Ms.] Connearney before the Nov. 21 incident" and that Ms. Hogan's behavior did not seem to be "rare or isolated."

Main Line Health is the parent company of LankenauMedicalCenter.

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