Flaws in Medicare rating system
WCCO out of Minnesota had an article about how most violations in nursing homes are under reported. This seems like common sense since most employees do not want to risk their jobs admitting mistakes, and there is not enough personnel to enforce the regulations or conduct proper investigations. Many complaints are ignored because the nursing home claims the resident was demented.
The system designed to help Minnesotans choose a nursing home for loved ones is under fire. Serious flaws in the system have been uncovered by a nursing home watchdog group. You might not know about physical and sexual abuse happening inside the nursing home.
Wes Bledsoe, the founder of a nursing home watchdog group, says he can prove that the rating system on Medicare.gov does not show what is really going on in nursing homes. For example, after all of the well known abuse at Good Samaritan Society in Albert Lea, a report from the Minnesota Department of Health says no deficiencies were noted at the nursing home.
At a different facility in the state, someone saw an employee pick up a nightgown soaked with urine and that worker "shoved it in the resident's mouth and told her to shut up." Again, the Department of Health didn't note any deficiencies.
A spokesperson from the Minnesota Department of Health said "If a facility has taken appropriate steps to correct problems, they may not be cited with deficiencies." However, when deficiencies aren't noted, they don't show up on the Medicare site, so there's no way you could know if you've only checked that Web site.
Bledsoe said it's happening all the time. He found that 80 percent of confirmed abuse cases in Minnesota in the last four years didn't get reported to the feds.
"I think it's bureaucratic mumbo-jumbo that's deceiving the consumers and the American public about what's really going on in our long-term care facilities," said Bledsoe.
Bledsoe said another big problem is the star system on the Medicare Web site. On a lot of the nursing home Web sites, a lot of the information is not available, so he's wondering how they can give a place four or five stars when there's no information.
