Nursing Home Abuse Lawyer Blog

Kool-Aid dripped on insulin bottles. Expired medications in the refrigerator. No milk in a month due to an unpaid bill. Odors of urine and feces in a hallway. Residents bathing every other day due to no clean towels and a shower that was visibly "dirty and stained with a black and green substance". A resident tried to hit another resident with a wall hanging and facility staff reportedly did nothing. Facility staff reported that the current Administrator only stopped in one or two times a month.

These are the conditions that 35 disabled people were living with in December 2010 when Kentucky state inspectors visited Golden Years Rest Home in Lechter County, Kentucky. Yet, this is not the first time that Golden Year has fallen under state scrutiny.

Eloping Resident Freezes to Death

Larry Huff was 64 year old resident at Golden Years back in December 2006. Huff suffered from mild dementia, schizophrenia, and alcoholism. He wandered away from the facility at least six times prior to January 8, 2007. On that date, he wandered away, never to return. Huff was found frozen to death in the snow.

Facility staff waited seventeen hours to alert police that Huff was missing, despite his history of wandering. Huff's family believes that if the police had been promptly called Larry Huff would still be alive. The Huff family sued the facility and settled their case in 2010.

Residents Suffer Physical Assault, Theft

James "Chum" Tackett was the administrator in 2007, the year that Larry Huff went missing and a resident was assaulted.

According to an Inspector General's citation, a resident claimed that Tackett smacked him in the face and hit him on the head with a rubber hammer. The resident tackled Tackett and Tackett and another staff member began hitting the resident, which caused the resident to slam into a filing cabinet. The resident suffered a would that required several stitches.

State regulators investigated the incident and found that the staff member assisting Tackett in the assault had a criminal conviction for sex with a minor, but the facility had not performed the appropriate state-required criminal background check. Tackett pleaded guilty to reckless abuse of an adult in 2009 and was sentenced to two years probation. As part of the probation agreement, Tackett was no longer allowed contact with the facility, yet, he was present in July 2009 when state inspectors showed up. The facility was cited again for allowing Tackett to be present in the building.

Tackett was charged with taking up to $500,000 in state and federal payments that were due the residents at the facility in April 2010. The indictment came after the Attorney General's Office concluded a seven month investigation. Tackett and the facility have pleaded not guilty to the pending charges. A trial is set for October 3, 2011.

New Leadership

After all the recent problems at the facility, Jonah Tackett, Chum Tackett's grandson, took over running the facility. According to Jonah Tackett, the problems found in the December inspection have been corrected but some of them were misstated or overblown. Tackett did admit that the facility did not have milk for a while but excused it by saying, "We had 2 percent powered and they liked that just as good."

Continue reading " Hardly "Golden Years" For Kentucky Personal Care Home Residents " »

In yet another example of taking advantage of an elderly person, we look to Montana where an eighty-two year old nursing home resident was apparently supporting a woman and her two children, without knowing it.

Jerome Wilson lives at Park Place Health Care Center in Great Falls, Montana. He suffers from dementia and Parkinson's disease. Somehow, Tamara Belcourt reportedly managed to get appointed as Wilson's Power of Attorney, despite the fact that he was unable to consent to the appointment.

In March 2010, a case worker interviewed Mr. Wilson and determined that he was delinquent in his payments to the nursing home in which he lived but he was unaware of his financial situation. The case worker consulted Belcourt and discovered that Belcourt had used Wilson's monthly income from Social Security and a pension plan to support her two children, reportedly withdrawing more than $11,500 from Wilson's bank accounts. None of the money withdrawn was used to support Wilson.

Belcourt faces charges of felony elder abuse and/or exploitation. Her bond is set at $5,000.

An Illinois assisted living center faces a lawsuit in the death of one of its residents.

Anastasia Hubert was walking in a hallway at Cambridge House on February 2, 2010, when she reportedly tripped on a telephone cord near a third floor nurse's desk and fell, suffering a spinal fracture of the distal right femur. Hubert's overall physical condition declined, she developed pneumonia, and died.

The family of Ms. Hubert filed a lawsuit on December 21, 2010 in St. Clair County Circuit Court against the facility and BMA Management alleging that Ms. Hubert's injuries caused her to incur medical costs, experience pain and suffering, and sustain loss of normal life. The family blames the entities for allowing the telephone cord to be in a known walking path without properly securing it and for installing the telephone in such a way that it was a trip hazard for residents.

The lawsuit seeks more than $200,000 plus court costs.

This case seems like a "no-brainer" to me. Even in the best of circumstances, a telephone cord represents a tripping hazard. However, when you place a known hazard in a nursing home filled with individuals who are more vulnerable than most people, it becomes a case of gross negligence. The family of Ms. Hubert will need to show that the nursing home knew or should have known that the telephone cord represented a tripping hazard and that they could have forseen that a resident could trip and fall.

The Terry Law Firm is experienced in handling cases involving trip and fall injuries at nursing homes in Missouri and Illinois. If you have suffered an injury at a Missouri or Illinois nursing home, contact David Terry with any questions or concerns you might have at 314-878-9797 or toll-free at 888-317-2525.

A ninety-seven year old Iowa nursing home resident is dead after a traffic accident caused injuries that contributed to her death.

Corine Armentrout was the passenger in a van that was returning residents to Ridgecrest Village, a Davenport, Iowa nursing home facility, after the residents had attended the Festival of Trees celebration. Armentrout, who was wheelchair-bound, was thrown from her wheelchair onto the floor of the van when the van's driver abruptly stopped for a traffic light. According to the Iowa Department of Inspections and Appeals, while the wheelchairs were appropriately secured to the floor of the van, the residents were not wearing safety belts. The driver of the van reportedly admitted forgetting to fasten the safety belts.

Armentrout was rushed to a local hospital, where she was resuscitated and received blood transfusions. Her injuries were numerous: two broken legs, a broken wrist, broken finger, possible neck fracture, and acute blood loss. The other injured resident suffered a fractured pelvis. Armentrout died twelve days after the accident from congestive heart failure that was attributed to her broken leg and severe blood loss.

The facility was fined $10,000 as a result of the incident.

The Terry Law Firm offers their condolences to the Arementrout family on their loss.

A South Carolina caregiver faces elder abuse charges after a December 31, 2010 incident.

Forty-one year old Sonia King was making morning rounds at Carolina House on New Year's Eve when she reportedly slapped two elderly residents and threatened to choke a third resident. The residents were provided medical treatment.

King, who faces three counts of abuse of a vulnerable adult, was terminated from the facility.

Sadly, events like this are all too common in nursing homes. Nursing home owners are determining multiple ways to pocket the money they receive instead of providing quality care and quality employees. The result? Less care, more negligence, and more abuse.

If you suspect your loved one is suffering abuse at the hands of caregivers, contact the Terry Law Firm toll-free at 1-888-317-2525 for a free consultation.

We discussed Everett Rehabilitation and Care Center and its reportedly poor care of a ninety-seven year old man in a previous blog. Now, the owner of Everett Rehabilitation and Care Center has agreed to pay $3.5 million to settle a lawsuit filed by the man's family.

The resident entered the nursing home facility in 2004 to be with his wife. While she died shortly thereafter, he decided to continue living at the facility.

On November 7, 2007, a facility nurse found and reported a wound on the man's penis to the facility's residential care manager. That manager left for a three week vacation and forgot about the nurse's report upon her return. The manager said that she didn't hear anything more about the wound until March 14, 2008 after a doctor at the hospital called to report that the man's penis had disintegrated and that he had a terrible wound left. The man died on March 31, 2008.

According to the attorney for the victim's family, no one facility employee was to blame for man's poor care. The corporate decided to open two new specialty units at the facility and cut back on CNAs, the individuals reponsible for changing diapers and bathing residents. According to the attorney, "The place was woefully understaffed. That's why this occurred."

According to the facility's administrator, Elizabeth Loyet, "Settling the lawsuit is in the best interest of all parties in order to bring the matter to resolution."

If you have a loved one in a nursing home facility, the Terry Law Firm recommends that you frequently examine your loved one for unexplained bruising, cuts, scratches, or other injuries. Show the nursing supervisor on duty any injuries found and make sure that you note the date when you found the injury. Don't forget to follow up with nursing staff to make sure your loved one receives the appropriate necessary treatment.

A recently released study by the Inspector General's Office of the Department of Health and Human Services revealed that, over the last two years, for-profit nursing home facilities have greatly increased the percentage of facility residents classified as needing the highest levels of care in order to collect larger Medicare payments.

The study, entitled "Questionable Billing by Skilled Nursing Facilities" found that from 2006 to 2008, the percentage of residents classified in the highest therapy groups jumped from 17 percent to 28 percent, despite little change in diagnoses or demographics. The result? A cost of an additional $5 billion cost to Medicare.

Costs incurred by individuals entering nursing homes after a hospitalization, which is paid for by Medicare Part A, are classified in a category known as a resource utilization groups (RUGs). The group the individuals are placed in is dependent upon how much therapy is needed and how much assistance with activities of daily living is required for the resident. The higher the RUG category, the more Medicare is required to pay.

For-profit nursing homes constitute more than 2/3 of nursing homes in the United States. Nearly 1/3 of residents in for-profit nursing homes were placed in the highest RUGs, while nonprofit facilities had 18% and government facilities had 13%. For-profit facilities were found to keep residents longer, up to 29 days opposed to 23 days at nonprofit facilities. According to the recently released report, "These billing patterns indicate that certain [skilled nursing facilities] may be routinely placing beneficiaries into higher paying RUGs...or keeping beneficiaries in Part A [stays] longer than necessary."

The Inspector General's Office made multiple recommendations to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services for improvement and referred the 348 worst offenders to Medicare officials for action.

Robert Price

An Oregon nursing home resident reportedly was sexually assaulted by an employee of the facility. The resident, who is mentally incapacitated, was allegedly sexually assaulted at Valley West Health Care Center in Eugene, Oregon on December 22, 2010. Employees of Valley West Health Care Center notified local police, who arrested Robert Price, a facility employee. Price has pleaded not guilty to first degree sex abuse. He is schedule to appear in court on January 27, 2011.

Whether Mr. Price is guilty of sexually assaulting a resident or not, we don't yet know. What we do know is that far too many nursing home residents are victims of rape and sexual assault. Why? Because sexual predators recognize the elderly as easy targets due to physical and mental infirmities. Nursing home companies are often culpable by failing to adequately check the employee's background or failing to supervise employees. By reducing staffing levels so low they enable those who are prone to assault.

If your loved one has been sexually assaulted, call the police, call the state, and call an attorney.