Whether the emergency imperative of EMTALA displaces a State Law medical malpractice exception and requires proper emergency patient treatment

A tightly stretched fence wire snapped into Ricky Koel’s right eye, piercing the globe. He arrived at Citizens Medical Center —vomiting from pain but still able to per ceive light —indicating vision could be saved with timely inter vention. Staff suspected a ruptured globe, a known emergency. Yet instead of referring him to an ophthalmologist or arranging transfer, the hospital summoned an optometrist —unqualified under EMTALA or hospital bylaws to screen. Mr. Koel was misdiagnosed, not transferred, and left permanently blind. This case pre sents a clean vehicle to resolve a core EMTALA issue left open by the Court’s dis missal of Moyle v. United States , 603 U.S. 324 (2024) : when hospitals fail to treat or transfer patients with known emergencies. Unlike Moyle , there is no state law barrier here—only a failure to follow EMTALA’s mandate. EMTALA forbids hospitals from treating emer gency patients dif ferently based on diag nosis, staffing, cost, or internal workarounds. The Questions are : 1. Whether the emergency imperative of EMTALA displaces a State Law medical malpractice exception just as the EMTALA emergency imperative displaced a state law abortion ban for purposes of the District Court’s injunction in Moyle v. United States ? 2. Whether the Tenth Circuit’s zeal to adhere to the EMTALA malpractice exception in Repp v. Anadarko Mun. Hosp. exposes a Circuit Split with the Fourth Circuit’s “standard to which the hospital adheres” rule in Power v. Arlington Hosp. Ass’n ? ii 3. Whether Dan Kuhlman, M.D., the Citizens’ Medical Center’s emergency depart ment medical director, violated EMTALA by allowing an unqualified Optometrist to examine and diagnose a serious eye injury and discharge the patient for economic reasons? iii LIST OF PROCEEDINGS United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit No. 23 -3232 Ricky Koel, Appellant v. Citizens’ Medical Center, Daniel P. Kuhlman, M.D., Sam Roger Funk, O.D. and Sam Roger Funk, O.D., P.A., Appellees Opinion : February 24, 2025 Rehearing Denial : March 24, 2025 _ United States District Court for the District of Kansas No. 2 :21-cv-2166 Ricky Koel, Plaintiff v. Citizens’ Medical Center, Daniel P. Kuhlman, M.D., Sam Roger Funk, O.D. and Sam Roger Funk, O.D., P.A., Defendants Date of Final Judgment : October 10, 2023