South Carolina Nursing Home Blog : South Carolina Nursing Home Lawyer & Attorney : Poliakoff & Associates Law Firm : Elderly Care, Senior Care

The Las Vegas Sun had an interesting article about the the Nevada Supreme Court's correct decision to upheld an arbitration award of $754,431 against the Manor Health Care Center in the negligence care of a patient in Las Vegas.

The court upheld the finding of an arbitrator that the standard of care was violated in the care of Edward Monsour.  Monsour died while in the care of the nursing home. The surviving children and the estate filed suit against the center. Both sides agreed in 2008 to binding arbitration before retired District Judge Stephen Huffaker.

Huffaker ruled the nursing home failed to provide the appropriate care mandated by skilled nursing home rules; that it did not keep accurate records of the care and “through neglect and recklessness, failed to provide adequate care, causing pain and suffering to both the deceased and his family.”  Huffaker rejected the wrongful death claim filed by the children.

Manor Health Care appealed but District Judge Timothy Williams backed up the arbitration award.

The Supreme Court rejected the argument of the health care center that the arbitrator wrongfully doubled the amount of certain damages.

The court said there is no evidence that Huffaker knew and disregarded the law in the handling of these claims.

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The Palm Beach Post had an article about  nursing home neglect that really pissed me off.  The nursing home resident that was neglected was a bilateral amputee with bed sores on his stumps and buttocks.  When a state inspector saw him, he was sleeping unattended in a wheelchair on the front walkway of the Azalea Court nursing home in West Palm Beach.  She noticed a lit cigarette smoldering on a towel covering the resident’s left stump. A 1-inch hole had burned into the towel and the edges of the fabric were glowing red. “Smoke was actively rising from the towel,” according to the inspection report. The man had been labeled a “safe smoker.”  The patient had been found asleep with a lighted cigarette on prior occasions. Two weeks earlier, a nurse found the man sitting outside the facility, sleeping with a lit cigarette in his mouth.

The incidents reflect the nursing home’s “intentional or negligent failure to provide adequate and appropriate health care,” state officials said in a complaint that called for a $31,000 fine against Azalea Court. As part of a settlement agreement, the fine was lowered this year to $11,000.

Azalea Court was also fined $5,000 this year when after state inspectors last year found maggots crawling out of the leg cast of a resident. That fine was initially $10,000. Azalea Court has appealed both fines to an administrative law judge.

The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration also has cited Azalea staff last year for failing to respond to an alarm connected to the front door of the facility that signals if people are leaving the facility.  In addition inspectors interviewed six residents who said they were scared to voice grievances with the facility for fear of retribution.  This is a common complaint in most nursing homes.  Residents are scared that the care will get worse if they complain or get a nurse in trouble.
 

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Multimillion verdict against Life Care thrown out (09/26/08 Cleveland Banner) By Linda Womack

Life Care Centers of America was given another trial when an $11.5 million verdict was thrown out.  The nursing home was found to have been negligent and reckless in the death of a former resident. Former Circuit Court Judge Ginger Wilson Buchanan was the judge.  Buchanan did not offer a reason on why the original verdict was set aside.

A Bradley County Circuit Court jury awarded the multi-million verdict in compensatory and punitive damages as a result of the June trial. Dennis Matthews, son of Verdie Matthews a former Life Care resident, filed a lawsuit against Life Care Centers of America alleging the nursing home allowed his mother to develop severe dehydration and severe malnutrition which ultimately played a role in her death.   The jury found Life Care Centers acted negligent and reckless in a three week trial in June.

Ms. Matthews was a resident at the nursing home for four weeks when she was admitted to the Bradley Memorial Hospital on May 1, 2006. She died three days later. Her cause of death was determined by the hospital to be severe nutrition and severe dehydration.

Medical records indicated at the time of Ms. Matthews admission to the nursing home her weight was reportedly 105 pounds. At the time of her death, four weeks later, she reportedly weighed 92 pounds.   Throughout the trial Mr. Matthews' attorney, Thomas Hornbuckle, argued the nursing home falsified fluid and nutrition intake records for Ms. Matthews and did not properly feed and hydrate her.

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When two residents at a nursing home in Santa Cruz got eviction notices last March, they decided to fight them. They called Linda Robinson of Advocacy Inc., a Santa Cruz nonprofit, to help them file appeals with the state Department of Health Services. A little more than a year later, the issue is being resolved according to an April 11 memo signed by Kathleen Billingsley, deputy director of the state health department.

The April 11 memo affects nearly 900 nursing home patients in Santa Cruz County as well as 1,400 nursing homes statewide with more than 133,000 beds.

"In a year, dozens, maybe hundreds, of [eviction] notices are sent," Connors said. "They get issued way too often in my experience. Patients have the right to be protected from arbitrary transfers"

Billingsley's April 11 memo to district managers covered policy and procedures for appealing eviction notices. It also said staff must receive training to make sure policy and procedures are followed.

Last year, a lawsuit was filed, complaining about a backlog of nursing-home complaints. This month, a state auditor, reporting on 17,000 complaints filed over two years, said the department had not completed about 60 percent of its investigations in a timely fashion.

See article here.

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