Minnesota Nursing Home Cited for Neglect in Resident's Death
Lakeshore, Inc., a Minnesota nursing home was cited for neglect of health care due to a medication error that led to a resident's death.
The female resident, who has not been identified, was admitted to the nursing home after being hospitalized for an infection on or about April 29, 2009. As she had a history of small strokes, for which she took the anticoagulant drug Coumadin, she was admitted to the facility with a prescription for Coumadin and an order for follow up testing on May 7 to ensure that her medication dosage was correct.
According to facility policy, the drug was to be discontinued on the day of testing and was to be resumed after the doctor had received the results and authorized a new prescription. Due to an error in transcribing the doctor's order, no blood test was performed and the Coumadin treatment was not resumed.
The woman was discharged from the nursing home facility on May 25. She was re-hospitalized on May 27. The medication error was not discovered until May 28, when the woman's relative called the facility. Sadly, the woman died on June 4 from a stroke caused by a blood clot.
According to Medicare.gov's new rating system, Lakeshore, Inc. ranks as a two star facility out of five stars, making it a "below-average" facility.
