252
Per Curiam
federal action under § 1395dd(d) as codified, alleging violations of § 1395dd(b).
The District Court granted summary judgment for respondent on the grounds that petitioner had failed to show that " 'either the medical opinion that Johnson was stable or the decision to authorize her transfer was caused by an improper motive.' " 111 F. 3d 405, 407 (CA6 1997). The Court of Appeals affirmed, holding that in order to state a claim in an EMTALA suit alleging a violation of § 1395dd(b)'s stabilization requirement, a plaintiff must show that the hospital's inappropriate stabilization resulted from an improper motive such as one involving the indigency, race, or sex of the patient. Id., at 411. In order to decide whether subsection (b) imposes such a requirement, we granted certiorari, 524 U. S. 915 (1998), and now reverse.
The Court of Appeals' holding—that proof of improper motive was necessary for recovery under § 1395dd(b)'s stabilization requirement—extended earlier Circuit precedent deciding that the "appropriate medical screening" duty under § 1395dd(a) also required proof of an improper motive. See Cleland v. Bronson Health Care Group, Inc., 917 F. 2d 266 (CA6 1990). The Court of Appeals in Cleland was concerned that Congress' use of the word "appropriate" in § 1395dd(a) might be interpreted incorrectly to permit federal liability under EMTALA for any violation covered by state malpractice law. Id., at 271. Accordingly, rather than interpret EMTALA so as to cover "at a minimum, the full panoply of state malpractice law, and at a maximum, . . . a guarantee of a successful result" in medical treatment, ibid., the Court of Appeals read § 1395dd(a)'s "appropriate medical screening" duty as requiring a plaintiff to show an improper reason why he or she received "less than standard attention [upon arrival] . . . at the emergency room," id., at 272.
Unlike the provision of EMTALA at issue in Cleland, § 1395dd(a), the provision at issue in this case, § 1395dd(b), contains no requirement of appropriateness. Subsection
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