California Injury Blog

In these times when nursing home abuse and negligence is at an all-time high, it is very important to be armed with pertinent information when you are looking for a nursing home for a loved one. A recent article in U.S. News talks about those nursing homes that are rated as "Special Focus Facility." The truth is there is nothing good or positive about the word "special" here. A Special Focus Facility is basically a nursing home with a history of negligence or consistently substandard results in health inspections - one that has been tagged for extra monitoring and inspections by the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services as well as the state where it operates. In other words, you want to stay away from these "special" nursing homes.

How does a nursing home gain this dubious status? It doesn't happen with a single health deficiency. For a nursing home to be tagged it would have to have three serious problems at three consecutive inspections. If repeat inspections were necessary because the nursing home did not rectify the problem, that becomes a serious issue as well. According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services there are about 135 nursing homes on this list. California has six of these homes. Officials say many more nursing homes should be on this list, but aren't because the federal agency simply does not have the resources or the manpower to go after these homes and conduct these inspections.

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California investigators believe that nursing home negligence may have caused the death of an 83-year-old man, who died from head injuries that were not properly assessed or treated by nursing home staff. According to an Associated Press news report, Lakewood Manor North in Los Angeles received an AA citation – the most severe that the California Department of Public Health issues. The negligence, according to officials, involved a patient who had slipped, fallen and suffered a head injury while trying to move from his bed to a wheelchair in 2007. The resulting head injury was not properly assessed or treated, investigators say. The man ended up dying four days after he fell.

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A recent Los Angeles nursing home accident has caused officials to investigate a Pico Rivera nursing home. The nursing home was fined $100,000 after a wheelchair-bound resident caught on fire and died while trying to light a cigarette in an unsupervised dining room, according to a CBS News report. The California Department of Public Health issued the AA citation and the fine on April 22, 2009 to the Riviera Healthcare Center. The fatal nursing home accidentapparently occurred on December 23, 2008 when the resident tried to light a cigarette without anyone present in the dining room.

The victim was burned over 40 percent of his body and died 18 days later. California health officials stated in their report that the nursing home neglected patient safety by failing to come up with a safety plan. Also, nursing home staff did not use a nearby fire blanket and extinguisher to put out the flames.

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California Nursing Home Negligence Could Increase with Lack of Oversight

A watchdog group, which is tracking nearly 1,600 nursing homes and assisted living facilities in northern California, is saying that it expects to see an increase in California nursing home negligence and abuse statewide. According to a News 10 report, Ombudsman Services of Northern California has lost two-thirds of its staff because of California budget cuts and the program's administrator, Joan Parks, is saying that she is already seeing evidence of nursing homes and assisted living facilities taking advantage of this lack of oversight.

This is not something that's happening only in northern California. In October, we reported about the loss of funding at the Orange County Council of Aging. Their ombudsmen have been doing an excellent job of making unannounced visits to local nursing homes and have detected cases of nursing home abuse and negligence. This group lost 55 percent of its program funding for the year and was forced to lay off almost all of its paid part-time field ombudsmen. This happened after Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed $3.8 million in state funding for long-term care ombudsman programs across California.

Apparently, even unpaid volunteers are being affected by this cut in funding. Some volunteers say they had to quit because they were no longer being reimbursed for mileage. Assemblyman Dave Jones (D-Sacramento) has co-authored legislation to restore funding for these ombudsmen. AB 392 would direct money to the programs from fines levied against nursing home operators who violate the law. We can only hope that this legislation passes and restores funding to this worthwhile group of people who were rendering invaluable service to California's seniors and their families.

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Escondido Nursing Home's Negligence Leads to Man's Death

An Escondido nursing home has been fined $90,000 after a resident apparently choked to death at lunch. According to a news report on San Diego's Channel 6, Escondido Care Center was also cited on March 12, 2009 for poor treatment and supervision of its patients. The California Department of Health states in its report that the man was supposed to be on a strict diet because he had trouble chewing and swallowing. But he was eating a lunch of beef with barbecue sauce, mashed potatoes, steamed cabbage and carrots last November when he coughed several times and slumped over in his wheelchair. Nursing home staff members were not able to revive him. Escondido Care Center has apparently appealed this citation.

My heart goes out to the family of this nursing home negligence victim. It is no doubt a tragic, heartbreaking event for this man's loved ones who believed that they had entrusted him to the care of professionals. They probably never doubted for a second that he would receive anything but the best level of care and attention at this San Diego County facility.

Unfortunately, nursing home negligence and abuse occurs far more commonly and frequently across the country. A lot of cases involving California nursing home negligence and abuse are due to understaffing and the lack of qualified, trained caregivers in these facilities. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, in a 2000 report, found out that about 54 percent of the nation's nursing homes were understaffed. The report also found that, at the time of the study, residents in 31 percent of the nation's nursing homes were receiving care for only about 12 minutes a day from registered nurses.

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The family of 79-year-old Shirley Marion Renner has filed a wrongful death lawsuit against a Yuba City nursing home alleging negligence and abuse. According to this news report in the Appeal Democrat, Renner’s daughter and son – Valeree Espinoza and David Vestal -- allege that their mother was horribly neglected at the Yuba Skilled Nursing Center. They say Renner suffered neck and spine injuries, severe bedsores, broken and missing teeth, “physical and emotional pain, desperation, abandonment, feelings of helplessness, anguish, shock, fear of imminent death” and eventually – death.

Although a Placer County death certificate lists heart attack and lung problems as causes of death, the Renner family complains that improperly treated bedsores, malnutrition and dehydration contributed to Renner’s failing health and death in November 2007. Renner has stayed about two years at the Emmanuel Health Care Center, which is now known as the Yuba Skilled Nursing Center and owned by Yuba Care & Rehabilitation Center Inc.

Renner’s son and daughter were also not informed about Renner’s poor condition including the bedsores, missing teeth and bruises on her arms and legs. Renner’s children eventually removed her from the nursing home because their mother thought she would die there. Although medical records have not yet been subpoenaed, Renner was apparently also given inappropriate psychotropic medications to treat dementia and Alzheimer’s. Yuba Skilled Nursing Center gets only a rating of two out of five stars from the Medicare Nursing Home Compare Web site. The nursing home also received eight complaints and two California Department of Public Health deficiencies in 2008.

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An Anaheim nursing home has been fined $75,000 by the California Department of Health for incorrectly reporting that an elderly resident died of a heart attack when he actually choked to death on a tuna sandwich. CBS News reports in this article that California Health and Human Services documents show the Anaheim Crest Nursing Center resident suffered from dementia and was supposed to be given only pureed food.

The incident apparently occurred Sept, 9, but the Orange County nursing home falsely reported that he died of a heart attack. The nursing home did not divulge the fact that the resident had choked on the sandwich until the coroner ruled that the man choked to death. The nursing home’s attorney is saying that this happened because the nursing home conducted a second investigation after the autopsy and learned that the resident had grabbed a sandwich from a food tray. The nursing home is also appealing the $75,000 state fine.

Based on this news report, I get the sense that this was an attempted cover-up by nursing home staff. This man choked on a tuna sandwich. Obviously, someone at this Anaheim nursing home was not telling the truth. They changed the story after the coroner’s autopsy report came out that had a clearly stated cause of death.

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Three nursing home staff members in Kern County have been arrested on suspicion of forcibly drugging patients for their own convenience, an act which resulted in the death of three residents. According to an article in the Los Angeles Times, the three victims were identified as Fannie May Brinkley, a patient in her 90s; Joseph Shepter, 76; and Alexander Zaiko, 85.

Attorney General Jerry Brown announced the arrests of Gwen Hughes, a former nurse, Debbi Hayes, a pharmacist and Dr. Hoshang Pormir, a physician at Kern Valley Healthcare District in Lake Isabella. All three face elder nursing home abuse charges while Hughes and Hayes face assault with a deadly weapon charges as well. According to the charges filed, among the drugs these so-called professionals used for “chemical restraint” were Zyprexa, Depakote and Risperdal. The families of all three victims have also filed civil complaints against the nursing home.

Apparently, Hughes who took over as Director of Nursing, ordered that Alzheimer’s and dementia patients at the skilled nursing facility be given high doses of psychotropic medications so they would be easy to handle and control. She ordered the forcible drugging of patients who argued with her or were noisy, disruptive or inconvenient to deal with.

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A nursing home in Lemon Grove has been cited and fined $80,000 by the state for failing to properly supervise a 74-year-old woman who caught fire last year while smoking at the facility and later died of burn injuries. The “AA” citation against Lemon Grove Care & Rehabilitation Center is the most severe under California law and was issued by the California Department of Health, which inspects nursing homes for code compliance. Our source for this blog was this news report in the San Diego Union-Tribune.

The 158-bed nursing home has apparently received two minor citations last year and one in 2005, all with fines of $1,000 or less. The nursing home’s administrators have said they plan to challenge the AA citation and penalty in California Superior Court. They are also denying that they did anything wrong that contributed to the resident’s injury or death.

The state’s report says that no staff members were monitoring the woman and two other residents as they smoked on March 31, 2008 in the facility’s gazebo. The woman, who was seated in an electric scooter, pulled a nylon jacket over her head to block the wind as she lit her cigarette. The jacket caught fire and burned her head, chest and arms, the report states. She died of the San Diego nursing home burn injuries 10 days after this incident. The woman, who apparently suffered from memory loss, had lived at that Lemon Grove nursing home for more than a year. She smoked everyday, but needed to be reminded constantly to smoke only in designated areas.

Continue reading "San Diego Nursing Home Fined for Negligence" »

A nursing home in Auburn, California, has been slapped with the most severe citation for negligence and inadequate care that apparently led to the death of a patient in 2007, according to the Sacramento Bee news report. Colonial Healthcare, which is owned by Rocklin-based Horizon West Healthcare, must pay a $100,000 fine for failing to properly care for an 83-year-old resident who fell and broke several ribs.

According to the California Department of Public Health, the man died after suffering “excruciating, unrelieved pain” for 21 hours and then being given an excessive dose of narcotic pain medication. This is apparently the third time the state agency has issued an AA citation against this particular facility since 2007.

My heart goes out to the family of this Auburn nursing home patient. Here is a family that entrusted their loved one to the care of a facility that they believed was professionally equipped to provide quality care. Such an incident is a definite breach of that family’s trust. There is no excuse for it. It is disturbing, appalling and despicable that a nursing home would neglect a vulnerable, elderly patient to this extent.

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Nursing home owners around the country are apparently trying to present arguments in favor of limiting damages in lawsuits against nursing homes. According to this news blog written by Maryland nursing home abuse and negligence lawyer, Sharon Christie, the nursing home industry is arguing that these limits or caps are necessary because the cost of defending frivolous lawsuits are a drain on resources that could otherwise be devoted to patient care.

When I read this I had the same question that Christie asks in her blog: Are you kidding me? The nursing home industry is not the one to be talking about frivolous lawsuits. As Christie says in her blog, the nursing home industry defines all lawsuits as frivolous – even when patients or residents have suffered catastrophic injuries or death due to nursing home staff’s negligence, ignorance or lack of training. As attorneys who handle California nursing home negligence and abuse cases, we see this on a regular basis.

If nursing homes are so conscientious about providing quality care for their patients, why did a recent federal study find that one out of five nursing homes in the country had serious deficiencies? Why do nursing homes spend substantial amounts of money defending lawsuits where negligence is very obvious? How does this make sense? It would benefit everyone when a nursing home does what it is supposed to do – spend money on hiring adequate staff to serve their residents and hiring qualified and trained staff, who have the skill and ability to provide quality care to their customers.

Continue reading "Maryland’s Best Medical Practice and Nursing Home Negligence Lawyer" »

Los Angeles County supervisors have asked state officials to require California’s nursing homes to prominently post their new federal star ratings, just the way Los Angeles County restaurants display their letter grades. According to this news report in the Los Angeles Times, this proposal is not being supported by patient advocates and nursing home officials, who say that the new federal five-star rating is flawed because it overlooks significant violations and sometimes, even penalizes well-run nursing homes.

California apparently has 1,254 federally rated nursing homes, more than any other state. Out of those, 272 nursing homes received the “one-star rating,” which is the lowest and 148 received five stars, the highest rating. Los Angeles County supervisors have unanimously voted to ask Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and state health department officials to support their plan. The proposal also states that nursing homes that receive Medicare and Medi-Cal should display information about their federal rating in any admissions agreements for new patients. Supervisors also voted to link Los Angeles County’s Web site to the federal rating site, Nursing Home Compare.

The ratings were first issued by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in December after patients and advocates complained that information about nursing homes on their Web site was far from user-friendly. The ratings were based on three years of data gleaned from state inspections and reports provided by nursing homes. The facilities are rated based on, among others, how the nursing home responds to residents’ declining mobility, high-risk bedsores and pain.

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A recent Bush administration change in federal rules on nursing home inspections makes it near impossible for the public to get information about nursing home violations and complaints about nursing home abuse and negligence. According to this news report, this new federal rule restricts release of detailed nursing home inspection information if officials say they are administrative and have no significant public impact.

This new rule was apparently put into effect in October with little notice and without a public comment period. It is not surprising that consumer advocates are sharply criticizing the administration for closing the door on such crucial information.
Officials of the Department of Health and Human Services say their employees have been too burdened by requests for information. Under the rule change, state employees who inspect nursing homes for the federal government are reclassified as federal employees and are not allowed to provide “privileged” information of documents to the public without approval from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

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A new Web site launched by the Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services on December 18, 2008 will help consumers evaluate nursing home care. According to this news report in the Bakersfield Californian, the agency will launch a Five Star Quality Rating System on its Nursing Home Compare Web site.

This Web site apparently already provides beneficiaries of Medicare with comparison information on 17,000 nursing homes nationwide. But this new online rating tool will utilize federal data to score each nursing home’s performance and competence in three important areas: health inspections, staffing and quality measures. The best nursing homes will receive a “five-star” rating while the worst nursing homes will receive a “one-star” rating.

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A 35-year-old male nursing assistant has been arrested on suspicion of sexually assaulting two women in his care at Anaheim Terrace Care Center in the 100 block of South Knott Avenue. One of Alejandro Arias’ victims is 84 years old and the other 60, The Orange County Register reports. Both the victims alleged that Arias groped them and then forced them to touch him inappropriately.

Officials say Arias may have worked at another elder care facility in Orange County before he began working for Anaheim Terrace Care Center. He has apparently been a certified nursing assistant for the last two years. Administrators at Anaheim Terrace reported the allegations to police. Arias has been charged with three felony counts of sexual battery on an institutionalized victim and numerous other misdemeanor counts. Police investigators are still looking for others who may have been abused or victimized by Arias. If you have any information, please call Detective Omar Adham at 714-765-1623.

My heart goes out to both the victims and their families. These were vulnerable nursing home residents who could not care for themselves. They were dependent on this nursing assistant to tend to their basic needs and he apparently took advantage of it. Despicable!

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Two teenage girls, who worked at a Minnesota nursing home, are being charged with physically, emotionally and sexually abusing elderly Alzheimer’s patients at the facility, according to this shocking MSNBC News report. Brianna Broitzman, 19, and Ashton Larson, 18, allegedly spat in residents’ mouths, poked and grabbed them and at times mocked them until they screamed. Both teenagers worked as part-time nursing aides at the Good Samaritan Society nursing home.

Five other teens, who worked with these two young women, were charged as juveniles for failing to report these incidents. Both Broitzman and Larson have been charged with assault, abuse of a vulnerable adult by a caregiver, abuse of a vulnerable adult with sexual contact, disorderly conduct and failing to report suspected maltreatment – all gross misdemeanors. According to the Minnesota Department of Health’s report, 15 residents with Alzheimer’s or other dementia related disorders were abused at Good Samaritan Society between January 1, 2008 and May 1, 2008.

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A 44-year-old woman who suffered permanent brain damage as a result of poor care she received in an El Cajon County owned nursing home has been awarded $1.6 million in a court settlement. Ruth Lomeo suffered severe brain injuries after she was given excessive pain medication at Edgemoor Geriatric Hospital in Santee. Staff at the nursing home also waited 20 minutes to call 911 after Lomeo began to have breathing problems. Lomeo sustained brain damage from lack of oxygen. Our source for this blog was a news report in the San Diego Union Tribune.

Nursing home officials contended that they had done nothing wrong and said that the nursing home had corrected any existing deficiencies. But the point is, those corrections, if they happened, came too late for Ruth Lomeo. In her case, a horrible damage had already been done. Lomeo, a lupus patient, was sent to the nursing home for recovery. Instead, her brain injury has left her with the mental ability of a 5-year-old, unable to care for herself or communicate with her family members. Further, she is going to need 24/7 care for the rest of her life.

The county’s attorney says the nursing home made a “business decision” to settle this case. They were simply concerned that this case could have cost them a lot more if it had gone before a jury. The problem with many nursing homes is that they are becoming more of a business and less of a service. They are becoming increasingly conscious of their profits, which is certainly important. Without profit, any business will cease to exist. However, it is unethical and inhumane for a business, especially one that cares for vulnerable, frail individuals, to put profits over the precious lives of the people they care for.

Continue reading "El Cajon Woman Suffers Brain Injuries from Nursing Home Negligence" »

I came across a news report in the Des Moines Register that shows how nursing homes with a history of abuse, negligence and other past violations receive hundreds of millions of your taxpayer dollars as bonuses. According to this eye-opening investigative report, a review of 81 bonus payment programs in 36 states shows that some nursing homes are collecting “quality-of-care bonuses” handed out by the same federal agency that considers them to be below-average caregivers.

In addition to this nonsense, more than 60 existing bonus programs help nursing homes do what they are already required to do under the law such as pay minimum wage or install fire safety sprinklers for the safety of their residents. The newspaper gives the example of Grace Living Center in Norman, Oklahoma, which earned almost $96,000 in bonuses over the last one year and is considered a “five-star” nursing home by the state. Still, it has been cited for more violations than the state and national average. What’s more – Medicare ranks the home “below average” on 11 out of 19 national quality measures.

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Extendicare, a large Minnesota nursing home corporation, is facing a federal class-action lawsuit from its customers who are alleging that it used deceptive marketing to entice seniors into facilities that were often cited for deficiencies and sub-standard care. According to a news report in the Pioneer Press, the nursing home company readily admitted “high-dollar seniors” – patients who bring in a high rate of reimbursement -- without first looking into whether they can meet their needs. The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court in Minneapolis.

Patients such as 59-year-old Laura Bernstein, who is named in the lawsuit, says Extendicare’s promotional materials claim that the company provides high-quality, skilled nursing care services and that their facilities maintain quality standards above and beyond what government regulations mandate. But state health department records show otherwise. Extendicare’s homes apparently received between 10 and 37 citations in recent years. In one instance, state investigators discovered that one of Extendicare’s nursing homes didn’t even take the necessary steps to rescue a resident who hanged himself.

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A Bakersfield nursing home is appealing a $100,000 state fine imposed for the death of a resident who investigators say choked on a tomato ketchup packet, The Bakersfield Californian reports in an October 23, 2008 article. California Department of Health investigators said the staff at Glenwood Gardens’ skilled nursing facility knew the 84-year-old man constantly tried to eat non-edible objects, but did not do anything to stop him from ingesting the ketchup packet in 2006. The patient had been diagnosed with dementia and breathing problems. A mortuary embalmer apparently discovered the ketchup packet wedged in the back of the man’s throat.

The state’s report also stated that the nursing home staff failed to come up with an effective plan to prevent the resident from eating non-edible items. Glenwood Gardens received the AA citation, which is issued when a resident death has occurred directly as a result of the nursing home’s negligence.

What did Glenwood Gardens officials have to say with regard to their appeal of the citation? That there “were no grounds we could find for the citation."

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