YVETTE KANE, District Judge.
Plaintiff Rahn Andre Jacobs, an inmate currently confined at the State Correctional Institution at Mahanoy, Pennsylvania, filed this civil rights action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Named as the sole Defendant is Dr. William W. Young, the prison doctor at the Dauphin County Prison ("DCP"), Pennsylvania, where the incidents alleged in the complaint occurred. Plaintiff alleges that Dr. Young was deliberately indifferent to his serious medical needs. Presently pending before the Court is Defendant's motion to dismiss the complaint. (Doc. No. 12.) For the reasons that follow, the motion will be denied.
When Plaintiff arrived at the Dauphin County Prison on July 29, 2011, he was a pretrial detainee. He was evaluated by a Registered Nurse and advised her of his medical issues. The following week, Plaintiff was seen by Defendant Young. Young questioned him about two of his medical issues — urethral strictures and arthritis. Plaintiff informed him that he had surgery approximately 4 months prior to his arrival at DCP, and was concerned because he was not urinating properly, had repeated urinary tract infections, and his urine flow was slow and very painful. He received no treatment in response to his complaints at this time. (Doc. No. 1, Compl. at 4.) About 4½ months later, Plaintiff again reported these concerns to the medical staff, and no attempt was made to address his problems. (
In December of 2011, Plaintiff states that his stream of urine was only a dribble/drops and that he was sluggish. On January 27, 2012, at approximately 3:30 a.m., he was unable to urinate at all. He informed a correctional officer of his problem, and he then notified the medical department. An LPN came to Plaintiff's cell around 6 a.m. and noticed that Plaintiff's ankles, calves, thighs, and face were swollen. Defendant Young was notified by phone, and his assessment was that Plaintiff was "Edemic x3." (
At 7 p.m. that evening, Plaintiff and several other inmates complained that he was in need of medical care. At 8:30 p.m., Plaintiff was escorted to the infirmary and examined by an RN and an LPN. Both of these individuals agreed that Plaintiff's bladder was overly extended. Plaintiff was taken back to his cell, and another call was made to Defendant Young. Plaintiff was again escorted to the medical department at 9 p.m., barely able to walk. He was informed that Young had issued an order to catheterize him. All attempts by the medical staff to do so failed. Plaintiff states that even a pediatric-size catheter was unsuccessful.
A third call was thereafter made to Defendant Young, and Plaintiff was assisted back to his cell. At 10:15 p.m., Plaintiff was taken to "Receiving and Release" and told he would be leaving the prison to go to the hospital emergency room once the shifts changed at 11:00 p.m. (Doc. No. 1 at 5.) He was later taken to Penn State Hershey Medical Center where he was seen by surgeon specialist Dr. Ross Decter.
Upon examination, Dr. Decter questioned Plaintiff's prison escort as to why he was not brought in sooner because his bladder was extended to the point of rupture. given. A surgical procedure called a "super pubic catheter" was performed in the triage area, as there was no time to wait for an operating room. (
On February 9, 2012, Plaintiff was ordered released from prison for proper medical care by Judge Andrew Dowling. His kidneys had been compromised due to the over-extension of his bladder, and he had developed Nephrotic Syndrome. His weight had increased from 170 pounds to 226 pounds. Ten days after his release, Plaintiff was admitted to the Harrisburg Hospital for 3 days. He thereafter had follow-up visits with his urologist, and was referred to a nephrologist specialist at Penn State Hershey Medical Center. After conducting some tests, the specialist ordered Plaintiff admitted to the Penn State Hershey Medical Center where he remained hospitalized for 25 days.
On September 24, 2012, Plaintiff was recommitted to DCP to await sentencing. He was screened by the medical department. Defendant Young informed Plaintiff that he had received electronic orders from Plaintiff's nephrologist to take blood and urine samples once per week to check Plaintiff's protein and creatine levels. Young was also told to taper Plaintiff off the medication prednisone. In November of 2012, Young stopped consulting with Plaintiff's outside doctors.
On January 7, 2013, Plaintiff was taken to the Harrisburg Hospital emergency room because no one in the DCP medical department knew how to change his super pubic catheter. At the hospital, after swabbing the catheter, it was discovered that Plaintiff had a staph infection. Plaintiff was prescribed tylenol with codeine for pain.
Although Plaintiff continued to complain about the pain while back at DCP, he states that no one responded to him. He claims that 2 months passed before he was prescribed Uriquid to fight his infection. He claims that he filed grievances with respect to this matter, and attaches documentation to his complaint. (
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) authorizes dismissal of a complaint for "failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted." Under Rule 12(b)(6), we must "accept all factual allegations as true, construe the complaint in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, and determine whether, under any reasonable reading of the complaint, the plaintiff may be entitled to relief."
In resolving a motion to dismiss, we thus "conduct a two-part analysis."
It appears that Plaintiff's inadequate medical care claims occurred at DCP both while he confined there as a pretrial detainee, as well as following his conviction. Claims of denial of medical care by pretrial detainees are "evaluate[d] . . . under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which prohibits the defendants from undertaking acts that amount to punishment."
The Eighth Amendment "requires prison officials to provide basic medical treatment to those whom it has incarcerated."
A serious medical need is "one that has been diagnosed by a physician as requiring treatment or one that is so obvious that a lay person would easily recognize the necessity for a doctor's attention."
A complaint that a physician or a medical department "has been negligent in diagnosing or treating a medical condition does not state a valid claim of medical mistreatment under the Eighth Amendment. . . ."
In his motion to dismiss, Defendant Young argues that Plaintiff received ongoing medical care and treatment for his condition. This care included medical testing, medication and evaluation by not only Young, but also by nurses and outside treatment facilities. Young maintains that Plaintiff is only able to demonstrate delays in treatment or negligence. (Doc. No. 14 at 6, Def's Opp'n Br.)
In accepting the facts alleged in the complaint as true, the Court finds that Plaintiff does state a plausible claim for relief under the above standards, and will be allowed to develop the record in an attempt to support his allegations. He clearly alleges that he made complaints to Young when he arrived at DCP with respect to the post-operative urinary conditions he was experiencing which included a slow urinary flow accompanied by pain, and that his complaints were ignored. He further details the events of January 27, 2012, and pleads sufficient facts to allege a claim of deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs that day to survive a motion to dismiss. His inability to urinate at all and swollen condition was reported to Dr. Young at 6 a.m. that morning, and no efforts were made to treat him until after 9 p.m. when all attempts to catheterize him failed. When he was ultimately transported to the hospital after 11 p.m. that evening, he was on the verge of a ruptured bladder. For these reasons, and without passing judgment as to the ultimate merits of Plaintiff's claims, the pending motion to dismiss will be denied. An appropriate order follows.