› $580,975,000 verdict in personal injury case
Latinos who worked in California and Texas nursing homes owned by Skilled Healthcare Group Inc. who claimed they were punished for speaking Spanish while at work will receive up to $450,000, free English classes and other compensation under a consent decree from a class-action lawsuit filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in Los Angeles, according to the Los Angeles Times.
A new rule issued in September by the Bush Administration has made a once routine process of obtaining information from nursing homes to back up claims of abuse and neglect almost impossible. That juggernaut has people who are suing nursing homes wrangling between state and federal officials, according to the Washington Post.
Rita Kittower had no choice but to put her husband of nearly 50 years into an assisted living facility after he suffered a major stroke that diminished his memory and left him unable to care for himself. Mrs. Kittower paid $75,000 a year to the upscale Silverado Senior Living facility in Calabasas, Calif., to provide her husband Elmore with the best possible care, according to the Los Angeles Times.
When he died, staff told her Mr. Kittower died peacefully in his sleep.
But when Mrs. Kittower received a call the day after burying her husband from an employee at Silverado, she was devastated. The caller said that shortly before Kittower died she saw a fellow employee punch Kittower’s husband’s face and wrap a towel around his head as if to suffocate him.
Nurse Haydee Parungano was an independent contractor who traveled Southern California to provide nursing services to Medicare patients. Her records show she worked every day between April 1, 2002, and August 31, 2003, including all weekends and holidays, averaging 20 visits per day.
During this time span, there were 60 days that Parungano claimed to have seen more than 32 patients – a feat that, at 45 minutes per patient, would take more than 24 hours to accomplish.
Last year, Parungano was sentenced to 57 months in federal prison for her role in a health care fraud scheme that ultimately cost Medicare more than $3 million.
Just another reminder to do your homework when checking out nursing homes: Sun-Mar, a company that runs 18 skilled nursing facilities in Southern California, had boasted in its brochures about the outstanding care it provides. Unfortunately, that was found not to be the case. According to the Los Angeles Times, Sun-Mar agreed to pay $2 million to former residents in a settlement stemming from a class-action lawsuit that alleged substandard care of its elderly patients.
