Trial News

A housekeeper who was injured on the job should have been informed of her rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and not just treated by a workers’ compensation physician, the Eleventh Circuit held. The court rejected the defendant employer’s argument that it is absolved of FMLA notice requirements because it offered workers’ comp and light-duty work to the plaintiff. (Ramji v. Hosp. Housekeeping Sys., 2021 WL 1257247 (11th Cir. Apr. 6, 2021).)

Noorjahan Ramji was a housekeeper at Eastside Medical Center in Snellville, Ga., for almost 11 years and worked for services contractor Hospital Housekeeping since 2013. In 2016, Ramji tripped and fell at work, injuring her knee. Hospital Housekeeping treated the injury as a workers’ comp claim, and Ramji was seen in the emergency room (ER), where a physician assistant issued her a four-day medical work excuse. Several days later, Ramji had a follow-up appointment with Dr. David Harkins, who recommended six-to-eight weeks of physical therapy and issued a light-duty medical work release. A month later, before her physical therapy treatment course was complete, Ramji had another follow-up visit with Harkins, who cleared her for regular-duty work. A Hospital Housekeeping director accompanied Ramji to all of these appointments and treatments.

Ramji reported to work the same day Harkins issued the regular-duty work release, and Hospital Housekeeping administered an “essential functions test” that included squats, kneeling, and stair climbing. Ramji was fired after failing the test due to pain from her injury. At no time was Ramji informed of her rights under the FMLA to take 12 continuous weeks of leave for treatment and recovery. She filed a workers’ comp claim when she was unable to afford continued medical appointments and physical therapy after losing her job. She later sued Hospital Housekeeping, alleging it interfered with her leave rights under the FMLA. The district court considered Ramji’s FMLA claim and granted the defendant summary judgment, finding that once Ramji was medically cleared to return to work, she was not entitled to any leave under the FMLA.

Vacating the lower court’s decision and reversing, the Eleventh Circuit held that “providing workers’ compensation benefits cannot absolve an employer of all obligations under the FMLA.” The court examined Ramji’s FMLA interference claim using a two-part test: whether Ramji was entitled to a benefit under the FMLA and whether her employer denied that benefit. The court concluded that there was adequate evidence that Ramji was entitled to a benefit because her knee injury was a qualifying reason to take FMLA leave—it was a “serious health condition” as an “injury” that required “continuing treatment” and made her “unable to perform the functions of [her] position.”

In addition, the court said, a reasonable jury could conclude that Hospital Housekeeping had notice of Ramji’s serious injury because its directors accompanied her to the ER, follow-up medical visits, and physical therapy. And when a formal workers’ comp claim was filed for Ramji on the date of her injury and she was given a medical release excusing her from work, Hospital Housekeeping had a duty to provide her with FMLA notice but did not. It does not matter whether Ramji expressly asked for FMLA leave, the court said—it is enough that her employer was on notice of her right to that leave.

The court rejected Hospital Housekeeping’s argument that when Ramji accepted light-duty work, it was absolved of its FMLA obligations. Under 29 C.F.R. §825.702(d)(1), the court noted, “an employer may not, in lieu of FMLA leave entitlement, require an employee to take a job with a reasonable accommodation,” such as light-duty work. Ramji was never given the opportunity to decide between the light-duty work and FMLA leave as she recovered from her injury, the court said.

Finally, the court considered whether Ramji was harmed by Hospital Housekeeping’s failure to inform her of her FMLA rights. Ramji claimed that had she been given an uninterrupted 12-week period of FMLA leave for recovery, she could have passed her essential functions test at the conclusion of her leave period and kept her job. Hospital Housekeeping countered that Ramji had not shown definitively that she would have made a full recovery during a 12-week leave period. However, the court found that the evidence Ramji presented was sufficient to allow a reasonable jury to find in her favor. Accordingly, the court remanded the case to the lower court for a trial.

Ramji’s attorney, Regan Keebaugh of Decatur, Ga., said he was “very pleased with the appellate court’s decision and looks forward to presenting the case to a jury. This is a broad reaching opinion that will protect Ms. Ramji’s rights under the FMLA as well as the rights of other workers in her situation.”