Caregivers of individuals who suffer from dementia and live at home should take precautionary measures to ensure their family member’s safety. This includes installing deadbolt or slide-bolt locks on exterior doors and limited access to potentially dangerous areas of the home. (Never lock a person with dementia in a home without supervision.)

Many nursing homes also take steps to keep patients suffering from cognitive disorders from wandering out of the home, such as keeping units locked and making sure residents prone to wander wear bracelets that trigger an alarm if they wander outside a safe area.

Even with such measures in place, some patients still manage to escape. Earlier this week the Chicago Tribune reported that an 81-year-old Illinois man who suffered from dementia was found dead on the side of a road after wandering out of his nursing home. He had slipped out a window.

And late last month we told you about an Ohio woman with dementia whose body was found 100 feet from the nursing home where she had wandered from earlier that evening.

For information on how to keep your family member safe, visit the Alzheimer’s Association at www.alz.org.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Wandering injuries, deaths a big concern for those with dementia

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Warren’s daughter Linda Meldrum repeatedly warned nursing home staff about her mother’s propensity to wander. She felt her mother was finally safe in a home with a locked unit. But Friday evening something went terribly wrong.

Last Friday, Warren’s body was found on the side of the road just 100 feet west of the nursing home. She was rushed to MetroHealth Medical Center in Cleveland, where she died hours later. Police say Warren disabled the alarm on the door of her room and wandered up the home’s long driveway to Detroit Road, where she was struck by a vehicle that then left the scene.

Warren’s family wants justice and is filing suit against the nursing home for allowing Warren to escape, which resulted in her tragic death, according to The Chronicle-Telegram.

Good Samaritan, which has an 87.7 overall satisfaction by the Ohio Long Term Care Consumer Guide, released a statement stating, “Out of respect for the privacy of the resident and their family, we cannot share any further information, other than to note that all other residents of our health care center are safe.”

Meanwhile, police say they are “basically working with minimal evidence” in the case and hope someone comes forward soon with information about the hit-and-run.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Family sues nursing home over resident’s hit-and-run death

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Last week, Riems entered an Alford plea to four counts of sexual battery and one count of gross sexual imposition. According to AP, an Alford plea is one in which the defendant does not plead guilty but does admit there is enough evidence against him for a conviction. Riems was sentenced Friday to 12 ½ years in prison.

According to earlier reports from Fox News/AP, Riems was accused of raping and assaulting a paralyzed patient. Coworkers reportedly complained nursing home management that he had a temper and had verbally abused patients. One former coworker of Riems said she saw him go into patients’ rooms for long periods of time. When questioned what he was doing in the rooms for so long, he would say “This is none of your business,” according to Fox News/AP.

Riems was videotaped last year admitting that he had abused about 100 patients at nursing homes since the 1980s. His attorney argued that the testimony was coerced and fought to keep the videotape out of trial. The judge ordered that the tape would be allowed in court, which led to Riems’ plea agreement just days before he was to stand trial.

The sentencing offers some closure for the heartbroken family members of the victims. ”I don’t think that anyone knows the hurt and the anger that I am holding for you,” AP reported Bilgen saying to Riems during the sentencing hearing. “It’s something that I will never forgive you for.”

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Ohio man sentenced for sexual abuse of nursing home patients

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The product, sold by the King Nut Co., of Solon, Ohio, under the brand names King Nut and Parnell’s Pride, are sold primarily to institutions such as nursing homes, hospitals and schools, or as one health official pointed out in the story, “This product could be in institutions with some pretty vulnerable populations, people who are ill and children.”

King Nut Co., voluntarily asked customers to stop selling the peanut butter, and its distributors are pulling tubs from cafeterias.

Salmonella is a bacteria usually found in poultry, eggs and meat, but also can grow in uncooked processed foods. Salmonella attacks the stomach and intestines, causing diarrhea or constipation, nausea, headaches, fever and vomiting. It is most often spread by improper disinfecting in food preparation. In 2007, an outbreak of salmonella that sickened more than 300 people was linked to Peter Pan brand peanut butter.

Federal health officials say the contamination could have occurred during the manufacturing process or from one of the ingredients. They continue to pinpoint the source of the bacteria, according to the report.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Salmonella outbreak linked to death of nursing home resident

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It seemed as if there was no one else to care for them.

A recent investigation has revealed that the residents there were subjected to deplorable living conditions, resulting in the nursing home closing and the Cincinnati Health Department being stripped of its ability to license and inspect skilled nursing homes and residential-care facilities, according to the Cincinnati (Ohio) Enquirer.

It all began last February when Cincinnati police officer Aaron Layton dropped by the facility in search of a suspect. He didn’t find the person he was looking for, but what he did find stopped him in his tracks. The condition of the home was sickening.

Officer Layton got a search warrant and returned 16 days later with other investigators and officers in tow. They were shocked at what they found: exposed wires, leaking sewage, soiled and torn mattresses, vomit on the floor, broken toilets, unqualified employees, improperly stored drugs and people languishing in their own waste.

“There was no compassion, no sympathy for people who were living in these conditions,” says Councilwoman Laketa Cole. “The very people you’d expect to be a proponent for them, failed them.”
The Ohio Department of Health reportedly inspected the facility in January and found 10 deficiencies. Just eight days before the raid in March, the state had cleared the facility of seven of the 10 problems cited, the Enquirer stated.

After months of debate, the City Council concluded city health inspectors had failed to protect the residents and ordered the city’s health department’s licensure and inspection responsibilities be handed over to the state.

Facilities administrator Abe Fischer could serve jail time because of 27 alleged building and fire code violations. He could learn as early as next week if the residential-care facility will lose its city license. The state began fining Fischer this spring – a bill that has reached more than $100,000 – and mandated that he no longer take on new Medicaid cases, according to the story.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Health department stripped of nursing home responsibilities

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