Jan 7, 2008 12:27 pm US/Pacific
Transgender's Suit Says Hospital Denied Surgery
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) ―
A transgender woman is suing a Catholic hospital in Daly City, claiming medical officials blocked her from getting surgery there because she had a sex-change operation.
Fifty-seven-year-old Charlene Hastings already had one major surgery she needed to become a woman. But she says when she called Seton Medical Center to inquire about breast enlargement surgery, an official told her it wasn't "God's will" for her to get that treatment.
Hastings says her plastic surgeon told her Seton wouldn't allow him to operate on transgender patients there.
She filed the discrimination suit Dec. 21 in San Francisco Superior Court.
A spokeswoman for Daughters of Charity Health System, which runs the hospital, says the surgical coordinator was following hospital policy in refusing Hastings' surgery.
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