Faculty Information

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  • Biography

    B.A., Northwestern University  
    J.D., Cornell Law School
     
    Prof. Evelyn M. Tenenbaum is a graduate of Northwestern University and Cornell Law School. She served in the Attorney General's office as a Section Chief and Assistant Solicitor General and was a consultant to the New York State Department of Health. She is currently also a Professor of Medical Education at Albany Medical College.
     
    Prof. Tenenbaum has extensive experience handling and supervising healthcare litigation. She has successfully handled dozens of cases in the federal and state courts, both at the trial level and on appeal. Her high- profile health policy cases cover areas including mandatory testing for AIDS, guidelines for office-based surgery, state sick-leave policies, the constitutionality of closing bathhouses, and reproductive policies at Catholic hospitals. She was the lead attorney in a class action involving the Social Security Administration's over-reliance on the treadmill exercise test and won class-wide relief entitling class members to disability benefits totaling more than $65 million and saving New York's state and local governments approximately $11 million per year.
     
    Prof. Tenenbaum has also handled and supervised dozens of civil rights cases. Her high-profile civil rights cases include a landmark decision upholding the constitutionality of applying the State Labor Relations Act to lay teachers at Catholic Schools. She currently teaches Lawyering and Public Health Policy and serves as faculty advisor to the Domenick L. Gabrielli National Family Moot Court Competition.

  • Forthcoming Publications

    An Innovation in Continuing Medical Education: Online, Remedial Education for Physicians Following a Professional Violation or Incident (with Dr. Bruce White and Dr. Wayne Shelton) will be published in the Spring 2013 N.Y. State Bar Association Health Law Journal.

    An excerpt from the article Sexual Expression and Intimacy Between Nursing Home Residents with Dementia: Balancing the Current Interests and Prior Values of Heterosexual and LGBT Residents (21 Temp. Pol. & Civ. Rts L. Rev. 459 (2012) will be published in Prof. Janet L. Dolgin’s and Prof. Lois Shepherd’s Bioethics and the Law (3d ed., forthcoming 2013).


  • Publications

    Revitalizing Informed Consent and Protecting Patient Autonomy: An Appeal to Abandon Objective Causation, 64 Oklahoma Law Review 697 (2012)
     
    Sexual Expression and Intimacy Between Demented Nursing Home Residents: Balancing the Current Interests and Prior Values of Heterosexual and LGBT Residents, 21 Temple Political and Civil Rights Law Review 459 (2012)

    Using Informed Consent to Reduce Preventable Medical Errors    , 21 Annals of Health Law 11 (2012)
     
    Chapter 14, Protecting Freedom of Religion in Prison: The Free Exercise Clause and RLUIPA in CURRENT ISSUES IN CONSTITUTIONAL LITIGATION (Carolina Academic Press, 2011)
     
    Chapter 15, The Eleventh Amendment in CURRENT ISSUES IN CONSTITUTIONAL LITIGATION (Carolina Academic Press, 2011)
     
    To Be or to Exist: Standards for Deciding Whether Dementia Patients in Nursing Homes Should Engage in Intimacy, Sex, and Adultery, 42 Indiana Law Review 675 (2009)

    Memory-Altering Drugs: Shifting the Paradigm of Informed Consent, 7 The American Journal of Bioethics 40 (2007) (coauthor)

    BODY WORLDS: Choosing to be Immortalized as an Educational Specimen,     7(4) The American Journal of Bioethics 38 (2007) (with Jenean M. Taranto)
     
    The Application of Labor Relations and Discrimination Statutes to Lay Teachers at Religious Schools: The Establishment Clause and the Pretext Inquiry, 64 Albany Law Review 629 (2000)
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  • Selected Presentations

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    • Four Independent Institutions and an Interprofessional Course, American Society of Law, Medicine, and Ethics Health Law Professors Conference, Tempe, Ariz., June 2012
    • Public Health Policy and Ethics Practicum, Alden March Bioethics Institute Clinical Ethics Capstone, Albany Medical College, January 2009, August 2009, May 2010, May 2011, May 2012
    • Federal Litigation Capstones, Inaugural Conference of the Albany Law School Center for Excellence in Law Teaching, Albany, March 2012
    • Reconciling Decision-Making Theories to Protect Intimacy Among Demented Nursing Home Patients, Conference on "Aging in the U.S.: The Next Civil Rights Movement?", Temple Univ., Philadelphia, October 2011
    • The Causation Element of Informed Consent and the Need for Change, American Society of Law, Medicine, and Ethics Health Law Professors Conference, Chicago, June 2011
    • The Causation Element of Informed Consent and Why Current Trends in Health Care Support the Need for Change, Albany Law School Faculty Workshop, October 2010
    • Ethics and Disability in Later Life, Conference on Disability and Ethics Through the Life Cycle, Union College, Schenectady, May 2010
    • Health Care Reform and the States, The 2010 Warren M. Anderson Legislative Breakfast Seminar Series (panel presentation), The Capitol, Albany, April 2010 
    • A New Approach to Helping Students Navigate the Rocky Mountain of Persuasive Facts, Rocky Mountain Legal Writing Conference, Tempe, Arizona, March 2009
    • Should Nursing Homes Permit Intimacy and Adultery Among Dementia Patients When the Non-Resident Spouse Objects?, American Society of Law, Medicine, and Ethics, Health Law Teacher's Conference, Philadelphia, June 2008
    • Adultery between Dementia Patients in Nursing Homes: Intimacy for the Lonely or Deplorable Violation of Marital Vows?, Midwest Family Law Conference, Indianapolis, June 2008
    • Elderly Drivers, WSLR Radio, The Surreal News, Sarasota, Florida, April 2008
    • Cryogenics in Florida, WSLR Radio, The Surreal News, Sarasota, Florida, September 2007
    • BODY WORLDS, Dignity, and the Uniform Anatomical Gift Act, American Society of Law, Medicine, and Ethics Health Law Professors Conference, Boston, June 2007
    • A Marriage of Necessity: Developing Facts Necessary for Effective Analysis and Argument Through Case Law Study, Rocky Mountain Legal Writing Conference, Las Vegas, March 2007
    • BODIES, the Exhibition, WSLR Radio, The Surreal News, Sarasota, Florida, January 2007
    • Blurring the Lines Between Clinical and Legal Writing Courses, Legal Writing Institute Biennial Meeting, Atlanta, June 2006
    • Building Formal Writing Training into the Clinical Experience, AALS Conference on Clinical Legal Education, NYC, May 2006

  • Selected Significant Cases

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    • Cooke Center for Learning and Development v. Mills, 19 A.D.3d 834, 797 N.Y.S.2d 173 (3d Dep't  2005).
      Upheld as rational Dept. of Education's interpretation of its regulations to mandate that disabled school children be educated, if possible, in their local public schools.

    • New York State Ass'n of Nurse Anesthetists v. Novello, 2 N.Y.2d 207, 810 N.E.2d 405, 778 N.Y.S.2d 123 (2004).
      Successfully defended Dept. of Health Guidelines for Office Based Surgery against claim that they would operate as regulations and therefore were not lawfully promulgated.

    • Madison-Oneida Board of Coop. Educ. Servs. v. Mills, 4 N.Y.3d 51, 823 N.E.2d 1265, 790 N.Y.S.2d 619 (2004).
      Upheld the Commissioner of Education's interpretation of the Education Law to give seniority protection to tenured teaching assistants.

    • New York State Ass'n of Cemeteries, Inc. v. Fishman, 2004 WL 2712405 (2d Cir. 2004).
      Upheld constitutionality of state statute prohibiting combinations of for-profit funeral entities and not-for-profit cemeteries to protect the long-term viability of the cemeteries and to protect consumers from unfair practices.  
                 
    • Employment Relations Board v. Christ the King Reg'l High School, 217 A.D.2d 701, 630 N.Y.S.2d 333 (2d Dep't 1995).
      Upheld the constitutionality of applying the State Labor Relations Act to the lay teachers at church-affiliated schools.

    • New York State Society of Surgeons v. Axelrod, 77 N.Y.2d 677, 572 N.E.2d 605, 569 N.Y.S.2d 922 (1991).
      Upheld the Commissioner of Health's decision not to add HIV infection to the lists of communicable and sexually transmissible diseases and, thereby, not to have mandatory testing or contact tracing for HIV infection.

    • State of New York v. Sullivan, 906 F.2d 910 (2d Cir. 1990).
      Affirmative class action invalidating the Social Security Administration's policy of relying exclusively on the treadmill exercise test in determining disability due to ischemic heart disease.  Class-wide relief was granted entitling class members to retroactive disability benefits totaling more than $65 million and saving New York's state and local governments approximately $11 million per year.
    • Mullen v. Axelrod, 74 N.Y.2d 580, 549 N.E.2d 144, 549 N.Y.S.2d 953 (1989).
      Upheld the Commissioner of Health's discretion to determine whether to proceed with disciplinary action against nursing home employees.
    • City of New York v. New St. Mark's Baths, 122 A.D.2d 747, 505 N.Y.S.2d 1015 (1st Dep't 1986),appeal dismissed, 70 N.Y.2d 693, 512 N.E.2d 555, 518 N.Y.S.2d 1029 (1987).
      Upheld the constitutionality of the state health regulation authorizing the closure of establishments where "high risk sexual activity" is taking place.
    • Catholic High School Ass'n v. Culvert, 753 F.2d 1161 (2d Cir. 1985).
      Landmark decision upholding the constitutionality of applying the State Labor Relations Act to lay teachers at church-operated schools.
    • General Camera Corp. v. Urban Dev. Corp., 734 F.2d 468 (2d Cir. 1984).
      Upheld granting attorney's fees to the state under 42 U.S.C. Section 1988 for having to defend frivolous lawsuits.
    • Sheepshead Nursing Home v. Heckler, 595 F. Supp. 992 (S.D.N.Y. 1984).
      Upheld the termination of Medicaid and Medicare payments to a nursing home based on the inadequate care and treatment given to the patients.
    • New York State Optometric Ass'n v. Blum, 92 A.D.2d 526, 460 N.Y.S.2d 482 (1st Dep't 1983).
      Dismissed Article 78 proceeding challenging fifteen year old Medicaid fee schedule applied to optometrists.
    • Committee to Abolish Sport Hunting, Inc. v. Palisades Interstate Park Comm'n, 84 A.D.2d 798, 444 N.Y.S.2d 161 (2d Dep't 1981).
      Upheld legality of deer hunt conducted for environmental reasons in Harriman State Park.
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