ADA and Unruh Act Lawsuits: 2025 Guide for California Healthcare Websites
Summary
California clinics and healthcare providers are increasingly being targeted under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act for inaccessible websites. With statutory damages of $4,000 per violation under Unruh, even a single missed alt tag or non-working form can result in costly litigation. This article explores what triggers these lawsuits, which risks are most common for clinics, and how tools like Clym’s Accessibility Widget and Accessibility Issue Reporting can help reduce exposure.
For California healthcare providers, accessibility obligations extend beyond ramps, parking, and exam rooms. Courts have ruled that a provider’s website is a place of public accommodation under the ADA. California’s Unruh Civil Rights Act goes further, attaching $4,000 statutory damages per violation plus attorney’s fees.
Because patients rely on websites for scheduling, intake, billing, and accessing care, digital barriers are treated as direct discrimination. For clinics, this means inaccessible websites are as risky as inaccessible facilities.
Why healthcare websites fall under ADA and Unruh Act
- ADA obligations: Title III of the ADA requires equal access in public accommodations, which courts interpret to include healthcare websites and patient portals.
- Unruh Act damages: Any ADA violation is automatically a Unruh violation, triggering $4,000 per instance plus attorney’s fees. Multiple barriers in one patient interaction can stack penalties.
- Healthcare context: Websites are essential to care delivery, from telehealth logins to prescription refills, so barriers have direct patient impact.
In the healthcare context, digital access is not a luxury, it’s a core part of how patients seek care.
Common accessibility barriers that trigger lawsuits
Barrier | Legal risk | Example in clinics |
|---|---|---|
Inaccessible forms | Screen reader users can’t complete required fields | Appointment scheduling form |
Missing alt text | Images are unreadable by assistive tech | Insurance card upload |
Keyboard traps | Users without a mouse get stuck navigating menus | Portal menus that trap users |
Low color contrast | Low vision users can’t read instructions or CTAs | Billing pages |
Untagged PDFs | Important content not accessible to screen readers | New patient intake packets |
Videos without captions | Hearing-impaired patients excluded | Health education videos |
Action for clinics: Audit forms, documents, and media for accessibility gaps, and remediate against WCAG 2.1 AA standards.
Rising trend: ADA and Unruh lawsuits accelerating
According to the California ADA Website Lawsuits 2025 Mid-Year Report, California saw 380 ADA website lawsuits filed in the first half of 2025, up from 255 in the same period in 2024, a 49% year-over-year increase. Los Angeles County led filings.
Because the Unruh Act sets damages at $4,000 per violation, a single patient encounter can lead to multiple claims:
Penalty stacking example:
- Inaccessible intake form (1 violation)
- Missing alt text on insurance upload (1 violation)
- Untagged PDF intake packet (1 violation)
- Keyboard trap in scheduling tool (1 violation)
Total = 4 violations x $4,000 = $16,000 + attorney’s fees
Multiply this across multiple patients, and the cost for a small clinic can rise quickly.
Real-world litigation trends and healthcare website cases
Courts have permitted several lawsuits related to healthcare websites to proceed under ADA, Unruh, and related privacy claims, reflecting a growing risk for clinics. Below are notable examples and trends:
R.S. v. Prime Healthcare Services, Inc.
In this case, the plaintiff alleges that Prime Healthcare embedded Facebook Pixels and other tracking technologies in its patient-facing portals, sending personally identifiable and protected health information (PHI) to third parties without consent.
On January 13, 2025, a court denied Prime Healthcare’s motion to dismiss the complaint, allowing the case to move into discovery.Alcazar v. Fashion Nova (Website Accessibility Settlement)
Although not a clinic, Fashion Nova’s high-profile settlement underscores the enforcement environment. The company agreed to pay $5.15 million and committed to improving its website accessibility.
Only California class members are eligible for monetary awards under Unruh, capped at $4,000 per claimant.Healthcare-wide Pixel / tracking litigation
More broadly, plaintiffs are suing hospitals and health systems over the use of Meta Pixel and similar tracking tech on web properties. One case claims that over 600 hospital systems have been implicated in transmitting data via those tools without clear patient consent.
This aligns with industry concern: embedding tracking tools in patient portals or clinical web pages can attract both privacy and accessibility claims.
Healthcare providers are increasingly challenged in cases involving:
- Intake forms without screen reader labels
- Education or resource pages with images missing alt text
- Billing or portal pages that break keyboard navigation
- PDFs and documents that are not accessible
When suits settle, clinics often absorb heavy costs in remediation, legal fees, and reputational damage.
Frequently overlooked triggers of liability
Even well-meaning clinics unintentionally create barriers that lead to legal risk. These are often missed:
- Embedded videos without captions or transcripts
- Untested third-party scheduling tools
- PDFs with scanned images but no structured data
- Accessibility statements that are outdated or missing
- Over-reliance on overlays, which often fail for assistive tech users
Healthcare clinics accessibility checklist
Step | Practical action | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
Audit | Run automated + manual accessibility tests | Finds hidden barriers before patients do |
Fix basics | Alt text, contrast, form labels, keyboard navigation | Common triggers for lawsuits |
Update documents | Convert untagged PDFs to accessible formats | Required for patient intake forms |
Publish | Post an accessibility statement | Transparency builds trust and shows good faith |
Vet vendors | Confirm scheduling, billing, and chat tools meet WCAG 2.1 AA | Third-party software is often the weak link |
Monitor | Test after every website update | Prevents regressions that create new violations |
Bringing it together
Reducing ADA and Unruh risk typically requires:
- Accessibility controls so patients can adjust text size, color contrast, and navigation.
- Testing workflows that identify and remediate barriers before patients encounter them.
- Policy tools to publish and update accessibility statements accurately.
Clinics that piece these together from different vendors often face gaps. Platforms that integrate accessibility controls, testing, and policy publishing simplify the process and provide stronger documentation.
That’s the approach Clym takes: offering healthcare providers a widget, testing tools, and policy management in one platform, helping clinics lower risk while improving patient access.
FAQs
Yes. Both laws apply regardless of clinic size if services are offered to the public.
It adds $4,000 in statutory damages per violation plus attorney’s fees, unlike the federal ADA.
Often no. Overlays frequently fail with assistive technologies and may increase lawsuit risk.
The WCAG 2.1 AA guidelines are the widely recognized benchmark.
By providing accessibility controls, testing features, and policy tools that help clinics improve access and reduce the risk of ADA and Unruh claims.
Alex is a Content Developer at Clym, where he researches and writes about everything related to data privacy and web accessibility compliance for businesses, helping them stay informed on their compliance needs and spreading awareness about making the web safer and more inclusive. When he’s not writing about compliance, Alex has his nose in a book or is hiking in the great outdoors.
Find out more about Alex