nursing home complaints – Author Site for William J. Beerman, Sr

Sen. Wyden Issues Statement About Nursing Home Issues

I wanted to post the recent statement by Sen. Ron Wyden about nursing homes to help it get the widest circulation possible. It is self-explanatory.

The statement reads in part “…one of the challenges this country faces today is ensuring that seniors in nursing homes are safe and well cared-for. Our best nursing homes meet a high standard of care, but tragically, not all do.”

Click to see the statement.

Home Page for Mary Regina’s Nursing Home book.

Resignation of State Health Commissioner, Other Sensational Events, Focus Attention on Senior Care in Minnesota

By William J. Beerman, Sr.

(This article was originally posted December 21 but was accidentally deleted. It was reposted December 27)

Stunning news developments have put the government oversight system for senior care facilities in Minnesota in the spotlight.

Several Republican state senators decried nursing home oversight problems in Minnesota at a press conference December 12 after a five-part Minneapolis Star-Tribune newspaper series in November described breakdowns in the state Health Department’s handling of elder abuse complaints, and a fired Health Department official filed a whistleblower complaint November 13.
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Then, on December 19, the Minnesota Commissioner of Health, Dr. Edward Ehlinger, resigned.

The GOP senators held their press conference to “demand answers from Minnesota Department of Health officials in response to recent reports of abuse and neglect in Minnesota senior care facilities and the failure by the Department of Health and Office of Health Facilities Complaints to follow up on complaints.”

The senators’ press conference came after Nancy Omandi, the director of the Health Regulation Division, which oversees the Office of Health Facilities Complaints, said she was fired after blowing the whistle over a “toxic culture” in her agency that interfered with protection of residents of senior care facilities in the state.

The Star-Tribune reported that as the population of seniors seeking care has increased, the Health Department has been overwhelmed by a dramatic surge in maltreatment complaints. The paper said the department received 25,226 complaints last year about abuse and neglect in senior care facilities, a seven-fold increase since 2010, and that last year the agency investigated only 3 percent of the complaints onsite.

The Office of the Legislative Auditor has begun preliminary investigations into the Office of Health Facilities Complaints, but those findings will not be made available until March.

“We cannot wait until the legislative session in March . . . . Lives hang in the balance,” said Senator Karin Housley, chair of the Senate Aging and Long-Term Care Policy Committee. “I demand accountability, transparency, and immediate attention to addressing these issues.” She said she had been concerned about the problems and pursuing answers from officials since she became committee chair in January.

She was joined at the press conference by five senators including Senator Michelle Benson, chair of the Senate Health and Human Services Finance and Policy Committee.

On December 19, the day of Ehlinger’s resignation, Governor Mark Dayton, a Democrat who has been serving since 2011, gave the Department of Human Services — the largest state department – new authority to direct Health Department staff, make personnel decisions, and implement changes to Health Department work and investigation practices.

The Health Department spokesman did not respond to an invitation to comment.

The December 12 news conference can be viewed at the Republican Caucus website.

Anxiety over nursing homes

Survey Sponsors Say Baby Boomers Are Anxious About Massachusetts Nursing Homes

A new survey of 250 Massachusetts Baby Boomers shows overwhelming anxiety about nursing homes with 90 percent of those surveyed fearing a move into a nursing home, according to a news release issued April 25, 2017 by the survey sponsor, Massachusetts Advocates for Nursing Home Reform (MANHR).

Ninety-two percent of respondents do not support the nursing home industry’s attempts to reduce protections for nursing home residents, MANHR said. Eighty eight percent felt nursing homes in Massachusetts did not have enough staff to provide quality care.

“Such strong negative results show that the vast majority of Massachusetts nursing homes are not living up to their promise of quality care,” said Arlene Germain, president, MANHR. The nursing home industry continues to work hard to remove regulations – we call them protections — that ensure the care, safety, and dignity of nursing home residents.”

Ninety-six percent of Massachusetts ‘Baby Boomers’ favor comprehensive reform to improve the lives of nursing home residents with 88 percent agreeing the Massachusetts Legislature does not make the quality of care of nursing home residents a high enough priority. Ninety-seven percent believe it is important for nursing homes where abuse occurs to be shut down.

“Nursing home residents are ‘the forgotten ones’ as most people don’t pay attention to this truly needy segment of our population,” said Martin Alintuck, senior advisor at MANHR. “When our elderly need help the most, we fail them by not reforming a system that many of them must choose because they get old and run out of money.”

Other Survey Results:

73 percent do not believe nursing homes make the best interests of their residents a priority.
86 percent do not believe there is enough media coverage of nursing home problems in Massachusetts.
66 percent do not believe it is right the Commonwealth does not have enough resources to investigate and police the thousands of annual complaints about nursing homes.

The MANHR/SurveyMonkey research was conducted between March 31, 2017 and April 11, 2017. The 250 respondents, 44 percent male and 56 female female, live in Massachusetts and are between the ages of 52-72.

MANHR said it is the only consumer group in Massachusetts advocating for nursing home residents.

I am awaiting a response to the news release from the Massachusetts Senior Care Association, the state affiliate of the American Health Care Association (AHCA). The AHCA is a non-profit federation of affiliate state health organizations, together representing more than 13,500 non-profit and for-profit nursing facility, assisted living, developmentally-disabled, and subacute care providers that care for approximately 1 million elderly and disabled individuals each day.