Silver Lake Care Center

Investigators cited the nursing home in February saying it failed “to screen for, prevent, identify, report and investigate abuse.” Former director of nursing Terri Conley said she resigned from the home in January because the home was severely understaffed. “If you don’t have enough staff, the residents are not going to get the care they need,” she told the newspaper. “Families of the residents noticed and came to me asking why there wasn’t enough staff.”

Several families have filed suit against the home for neglect and wrongful death, and a caretaker at the home, Jason Pearl, was charged last month with abuse. He is currently in Washington County Jail awaiting a preliminary hearing scheduled for next month.

The nursing home is also facing a litany of financial woes. The Housing and Urban Development’s Public Affairs Office said that an FHA-insured mortgage at was in default, which prompted the home’s closing, and at least one staffing agency is reportedly suing the nursing home owner for nonpayment.

Eddie Martin of Sallisaw is listed as a part owner in the home. Martin also holds an interest in seven other homes in Oklahoma, three of which no longer receive Medicare and Medicaid dollars because of serious code violations. A fourth home is currently under order to clear up deficiencies by May 8 or lose its federal funding as well.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › OK nursing home closes amid allegations of abuse, neglect

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

The bipartisan Fairness in Nursing Home Arbitration Act of 2009 “prevents nursing homes from deliberately hiding clauses within the fine print of contracts that force seniors to surrender their right to trial by jury and enter an unfair and one-sided mandatory binding arbitration process,” according to the American Association for Justice.

This is good news for the thousands of nursing home residents and their families, many of whom have already signed these one-sided agreements that leave them defenseless, like the family of Dean Cole.

In January, we told you about Cole, whose family had filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the nursing home where Cole lived for just 22 days. During his short stay at Golden Living Center Greeley, Cole, who suffered from dementia and required assistance, stopped eating or taking medication and dropped an alarming 20 pounds. Even after his wife questioned nursing home staff about his weight loss, they told her Cole was fine. He was later admitted to the hospital and diagnosed with severe dehydration, renal failure, pneumonia and colitis. He died 10 days later.

Unfortunately, Cole’s family was made to sign a one-sided mandatory binding arbitration clause, which denied them the right to trail by jury. The case is still pending.

“The Fairness in Nursing Home Arbitration Act will make sure negligent nursing home corporations can be held accountable by our most vulnerable citizens,” said American Association for Justice President Les Weisbrod. “This bill will prevent nursing home corporations from unfairly preying on seniors and stripping away their legal rights. Arbitration should only be voluntarily, not hidden away in the fine print of contracts during our seniors’ greatest time of need.”

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Bill protects nursing home residents from signing arbitration clauses

Former nursing home worker Walter Small was arrested and charged with homicide in connection with Young’s death, and released Friday on a $5,000 bond. No court date has yet been set.

Young’s family has since filed lawsuits against Standifer Place in Chattanooga and the Tennessee Department of Human Services for “hiding the death and burial” of Young. The family is seeking $35 million against the nursing home for its involvement in Young’s wrongful death, and $900,000 against the Department of Human Services to compensate for negligence the family says the department showed following Young’s death.

County Medical Examiner Frank King says he did not perform an autopsy at the time of Young’s death because he was told the victim had fallen and fractured his skull as the result of a seizure.

The attorneys representing Young’s family also contend that Adult Protective Services, which had legal guardianship of Young, did not try to locate Young’s family when he was dying. Instead, the agency made arrangements to bury him in a pauper’s grave.

A spokesman for the state Department of Human Services has said that the department attempted to contact Young’s known relatives prior to his death, but to no avail.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Aide arrested for wrong death of nursing home patient

Apparently an Arbor nursing home employee was so engrossed in the television program she was watching that she simply ignored the sound of the security alarm, according to MSNBC. When employees did finally see her body lying out in the bitter cold, they tried to cover up the fact that she had wandered away on their watch and froze to death. They brought her inside, covered her up, and told police she had died in her sleep.

But police were suspicious when they found the woman, still cold to the touch, in a hospital gown and lying on a gurney hooked up to an oxygen machine. Authorities quickly surmised that the staff never made the 3 a.m. bed check and ignored the door alarm. The woman’s daughters contend that gross neglect lead to their mother’s wrongful death. They filed suit against the nursing home just one week after their mother died.

Up to four female nursing home employees are expected to face criminal charges in the case.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Police: nursing home staff tried to cover up patient’s cause of death

Robert’s 80-year-old mother, Emily Townsend, was a resident at Kettle Brook Care Center, a nursing home owned by iCare Management when she fell from her bed last January and was hospitalized. She returned to the nursing home but suffered a second, more serious fall that caused a break in her hip. She was once again hospitalized and died three days later. Robert’s lawsuit contends that the home was negligent in its care of his mother and contributed to her wrongful death.

Robert reportedly had complained to authorities both before and after his mother’s initial fall. He claimed that the nursing home staff had removed a bed alarm, a personal alarm and a walker – items ordered by her doctor.

Robert learned that while his mother was at the nursing home, it was operating under an unpublicized consent order from the Connecticut Department of Public Health. That consent was given after the home was reprimanded and fined $25,000 and was put on probation for two years after a survey found the home had seriously jeopardized the health, safety and welfare of residents there. The original order would have prohibited the home from admitting new residents. The consent allowed the nursing home to continue operating but hire an independent physician as a medical consultant and an independent nurse consultant. Other actions were also required such as setting a minimum staff ratio and complying with various quality measures to prevent accidents.

Robert’s suit seeks an unspecified amount of damages.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Man files wrongful death lawsuit against nursing home

Sloan gradually began to hear the truth. CNA Karen Buck had hit and slapped Talbott numerous times in the face causing a black eye and two other facial bruises after Talbott spit at her. Sloan contends that Buck caused her mother pain while putting stockings on her sore feet.

The executive director of Williamsburg Village, now known as Golden Living Center, issued a statement saying that the nursing home had reported the situation to authorities and that the incident had been fully investigated by the state, the ombudsman, the police and the attorney general’s office. The statement claimed, “After the investigations were concluded, the alleged abuse was not substantiated, and the prosecutor has declined to pursue the case.”

However the prosecutor’s office did charge Buck with felony battery resulting in bodily injury. Battery becomes a felony offense when the victim is, among other things, an endangered adult, as was Talbott, who moved into the nursing home after suffering a stroke.

Talbott died less than three months later. Attorneys hired to represent Talbott’s estate claim that the brutal and savage assault and beating Talbott suffered at the hands of Buck, and the nursing home’s negligence, resulted in serious complications that ultimately led to Talbott’s wrongful death.

Golden Living Center has a four-star rating by the federal government, which his based on inspections, staffing levels and quality measurements.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › CNA punches, slaps nursing home patient in face

Last week, Cole’s family filed a federal wrongful-death lawsuit against the nursing home seeking more than $75,000 in damages.

Cole’s wife visited her husband daily and, noticing his weight loss, questioned nursing home staff about his eating habits. She was told he was fine, according to the story. However, a State Health Department investigation noted that staff had reported that Cole refused to eat or take medication and that he ate nothing at 15 out of 24 meals he was served during his first 20 days at the facility when he lost all the weight. A nutritional supplement was recommended by a dietary manager but the supplement was never ordered. A doctor was notified about Cole’s refusing of medications and food but there was never any mention of his dramatic weight loss, according to the report.

On Dec. 29, 2006, Cole was sent to the hospital. He was discharged to a different nursing home for hospice care on Jan. 10. He died on Jan. 21, 2007.

The investigation into the case found the home negligent in the care it provided Cole by “not preventing his dehydration, not maintaining his weight and not notifying his doctors of his dramatic weight loss,” according to the story.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Nursing home sued for wrongful death of man with dementia

Many nursing homes who care for patients with Alzheimer’s have practices in place to ensure patients who wander stay within the nursing home wing where they live. But few practices are foolproof.

Late last month, King wandered from his nursing home. That evening around 8 p.m., staff noticed he was missing and notified police. After hours of searching for the 73-year-old man, police got a report of a pedestrian hit and killed by a CSX train. It was King.

“This happens daily,” said Jane Marks with the West Virginia Chapter of the Alzheimer’s Association. “Unfortunately this situation was more dramatic and had a sad ending, but it does happen constantly.” Marks was quoted last month in The Charleston Gazette.

This morning, the newspaper reported that King’s children have now filed suit against Heartland of Charleston nursing home for wrongful death.

“George King Sr. could not care for himself or be allowed to walk outside the facility and the staff of the facility at Heartland of Charleston was aware of this fact,” the paper quotes the lawsuit.

The lawsuit contends that the staff of Heartland of Charleston failed to keep King secure and failed to utilize available resources to locate him. It also claims that staff did not immediately discover that King was missing nor did they properly use outdoor surveillance cameras to determine which direction he went when he left the nursing home. The lawsuit seeks unspecified compensatory and punitive damages

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Man wanders from nursing home, killed by passing train

Joanne now doubts that decision.

Last month, Luveda fell from her bed in the night and pressed her personal emergency call button. The fall caused a two-inch gash on her leg, which bled out on to the floor of her room at Villa Valencia. Nearly fifteen minutes later, a staffer called 911. When paramedics arrived, Luveda was unresponsive and was later pronounced dead at a local hospital.

The Orange County (Calif.) Register reported today that the family of Luveda has filed a wrongful death lawsuit in Orange County Superior Court against Villa Valencai and its owner, Sunrise Senior Living Inc. Joanne contends her mother’s death could have been prevented.

According to the story, a spokesman for the California Department of Social Services said Villa Valencia would be cited for not filing a report about Luveda’s death within seven days of the incident. The citation will require the facility to submit a report on how it would correct similar problems in the future.

While assisted living patients have similar needs to those in nursing homes, they are governed by less stringent regulations.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Family files wrongful death lawsuit against California facility

The Patient Safety and Abuse Prevention Act is sponsored by New Mexico’s senior senator, Pete Domenici, R-N.M., and Sen. Herb Kohl, D-Wis.

This process could greatly reduce the number of nursing home abuse and neglect cases that plague the long-term care industry. These are tragedies we hear about daily in the news, like the report two days ago of the Jacksonville, Ill., woman suing her father’s nursing home for his wrongful death just 19 days after he was admitted; or the painfully sad story last month of the four nursing home aides in Minnesota who taunted and molested 15 residents suffering from Alzheimer’s and dementia simply to “get a good laugh.”

“This bill is an important step in providing the safeguards needed to prevent abuse and mistreatment by those who care for our elderly and disabled,” Sen. Domenici was quoted as saying in The Daily Times. “I hope the Senate will pass it during this legislative session.”

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Senate to consider Patient Safety and Abuse Prevention bill

Jennifer Hopley, Mr. Hopley’s daughter and administrator of her father’s estate, filed an 18-count wrongful death lawsuit against the nursing home, two doctors, a nurse, and other facility staff. According to the story, the suit claims negligence in Mr. Hopley’s death for not properly monitoring his blood sugar levels and subjecting the patient to “great mental and physical pain prior to his death.”

The lawsuit also alleges that the nursing home created dangerous conditions for residents by employing staff at levels below the national average for similar long-term facilities. The lawsuit contends that Golden Moments also was under capitalized and that there are state and federal tax liens are against the facility exceeding $250,000, according to the report.

According to the National Diabetes Information Clearinghouse (NDIC), an information dissemination service of the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK), diabetes was the seventh leading cause of death in 2006. Overall, the risk for death among people with diabetes is about twice that of people without diabetes of similar age.

SOURCE: Nursing Home Abuse › Family sues Illinois nursing home for wrongful death