Interventional Pain Management Associates (IPMA), a Mountain Home, Arkansas pain management clinic, and Baxter Regional Medical Center, a nonprofit hospital, will pay $350,000 and furnish other relief to settle a retaliation lawsuit filed by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal agency announced. According to the EEOC’s lawsuit, IPMA and Baxter fired an employee in retaliation for her opposition to the sexual harassment of a co-worker. After receiving a complaint of sexual harassment on or about April 2019 from a medical technician against an IPMA physician and co-founder, Baxter’s human resources department investigated. When HR interviewed the physician assistant, she confirmed the medical technician’s allegations, including describing sexually explicit text messages from the physician shown to her by the medical technician. As a result of the investigation, the accused physician took a sabbatical leave.
Three years later, another IPMA physician, who knew the physician assistant participated in the investigation of his colleague, asked the physician assistant to resign. When she refused, IPMA and Baxter fired her. Unbeknownst to second physician, the employee recorded the conversation where he admitted, among other things, the companies asked her to resign because she responded to HR’s investigation of the alleged sexual harassment instead of reporting it second physician. The alleged conduct violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits retaliation against those who oppose sexual harassment or participate in an investigation of sexual harassment.