Woman accused of slapping nursing home patient gets probation

A Cape Girardeau woman accused of slapping a 98-year-old nursing home patient will spend the next two years on probation.

According to officials at the Cape Girardeau County Courthouse, Sherri Sprenger pleaded guilty to a charge of elder abuse Wednesday morning.

The judge gave Sprenger two years in jail, but put her on probation instead. But he told Sprenger she'd go to jail if she violates that probation.

Sprenger worked at the Lutheran Home in Cape Girardeau. She's since been fired.

Police say she admitted to losing her temper because the patient yelled at her.

Sprenger says she responded by slapping the elderly victim across the face with the back side of her hand. She says she didn't mean it, and she feels remorse.

Police responded after family members noticed bruising on the woman's face.

As part of her sentence, the judge ordered Sprenger to write the family an apology letter.

Woman accused of slapping nursing home patient gets probation - KFVS12 News & Weather Cape Girardeau, Carbondale, Poplar Bluff

Racism, patients’ lack of awareness contributing to health disparities for residents of color in Boston, specialists say

Health disparities persist in the city of Boston between people of color and white residents, and efforts to combat racism and increase minority patients’ awareness of their rights as health care consumers are needed to bridge the divide, specialists said on Monday.

Speaking at a forum hosted by the State of Black Boston, a coalition of groups that ­includes the Urban League of Eastern Massachusetts, public health specialists discussed findings that were detailed in a report that showed black Bostonians suffered from a number of serious health conditions at higher rates than white residents.

Dr. Karen Winkfield, a radiation oncologist at Massachusetts General Hospital, said people of color in the city sometimes do not seek medical care because they expect to be treated poorly by health providers.

“We have to realize that it’s real and we can’t just sweep it under the carpet,” Winkfield said at the forum, which was held at the Dimock Center in Roxbury, of the racial bias she said is faced by minorities in hospitals. She also said a lack of adequate transportation and child care are obstacles to care for minority patients.

According to the report, which the Urban League published in collaboration with other groups, black infants died at rates ranging from 8.7 to 14.6 children per 1,000 births between 1996 and 2008, compared to rates between 2.8 and 9.5 for white infants during that period.

Barbara Ferrer, executive ­director of the Boston Public Health Commission, said that stress related to the effects of racism is a major factor in the higher rates for black infants. She said public agencies and other groups must work to combat the effects of racial prejudice on public health.

Racism, patients’ lack of awareness contributing to health disparities for residents of color in Boston, specialists say - Metro Desk - Local news updates from The Boston Globe

Missouri nursing home worker no longer employed after abuse allegation

 

A worker at a Cape Girardeau assisted-living facility is no longer employed there following an allegation of assault from a 92-year-old female resident. Police said Monday they continue to investigate the charges and have alerted state authorities as is mandated by law.The Cape Girardeau Police Department received a report Wednesday about the possibility of elder abuse at the Lutheran Home in Cape Girardeau when visiting family members said they noticed their relative had bruising on her cheek, said department spokesman Darin Hickey. The nursing home resident told police she had been assaulted by a Lutheran Home staff member, Hickey said.

seMissourian.com: Local News: Cape nursing home worker no longer employed after abuse allegation (08/28/12)

Care home nurse fired

A NURSE who told a dying dementia patient it was “time for the big sleep” has been struck off.
Shiona Nelson made the heartless comment in front of the woman's family. The patient’s grand-daughter fled from the room in tears.
Nelson also let a student nurse practice taking blood samples from the pensioner, referred to as “Patient B”, and carried out an “unjustified” intimate examination of another patient.
She was in charge of training young nurses at a care home in her home town of Kirkcaldy, Fife.
The Nursing and Midwifery Council said her behaviour was “wholly unacceptable” and she was unfit to practice. Nelson did not turn up to hear the verdict.
Nelson, a registered nurse since 1983, made her callous deathbed comment in 2009 at the Adam House home in Kirkcaldy.
Care home nurse struck off after telling dying dementia patient it was 'time for the big sleep' - Daily Record

Vt nursing home sued in 2010 death

A Vermont nursing home has been sued over the death of a patient in 2010.
The son of 84-year-old Dorothy Papero has sued the Crescent Manor Nursing Home in Bennington.
The nursing home lawsuit alleges that Papero entered Rodolpho Davalos’ room and was told to “get out” before the 58-year-old man knocked her down. She suffered severe injuries and died two days later.

Police said Papero, who suffered from dementia, was known to wander about the home.
The complaint alleges the nursing home was negligent and asks for unspecified damages.
A lawyer representing the nursing home denying the claims.
Vt nursing home sued in 2010 death  : Times Argus Online

Poor Nursing Home Care

Read a great letter from a dedicated but frustrated nurse commenting on the level of care in nursing homes today: "I’m a registered nurse and have 15 years of experience working in long-term care facilities in the area. The facilities are a disgrace to humankind.

The negligent care given to the geriatric population is sinful. The last facility I worked in for two years had more than 20 nurses come in with love in their hearts and quit with their hearts broken. The nurses usually have more than 25 patients to care for — passing medications, performing treatments, helping families and documenting the care being given, all with only the help of two certified nursing assistants, who provide the incontinent care and feeding and who help patients with bathing and passing fluids.

A lot of these health care personnel don’t move real fast and have to work two jobs because of their low wages. They also have families to care for at home.

Patients are supposed to receive treatments, some of them three times a day. They are lucky, however, if they receive one treatment. These facilities are charging Medicare and Medicaid for supplies and some patients are not getting their medications properly due to the large patient assignments the nurses and CNAs face."

The Daily Advance

Disparate Nursing Home Care

The Chicago Police Department said it appeared to be a suicide. The Cook County Office of the Medical Examiner said it was an accident. But when 84-year-old Bennie Saxon fell four stories to his death May 4 at a predominantly black South Side nursing home, a lawyer retained by his family said it could be nursing home neglect.
An investigation by The Chicago Reporter found that the facility has the worst rating a nursing home can get–"three times the number of lawsuits of half of Chicago nursing homes–"and that residents get less than half the time each day with staff than residents at a predominantly white facility in Evanston operated by the same owner.
  Saxon, who had dementia, had been living at Alden Wentworth Rehabilitation and Health Care Center at 201 W. 69th Street in Greater Grand Crossing for about four weeks before his fatal fall, family members said. His family has retained an attorney to investigate whether Saxon received adequate care. "The law requires that [homes] take danger and fall precautions into account for people who are at risk for falling," the attorney said.

Murphy is awaiting autopsy reports and said a lawsuit could be filed within weeks. If so, it will be the 14th in Cook County court filed against the nursing home between 2004 and 2009, according to Cook County records obtained by the Reporter. That's more than three times the lawsuits than half of the city's 91 nursing homes; the median is four lawsuits.

At least one of those cases has been settled. In 2006, Alden Wentworth paid $600,000 related to the November 2000 death of Bernetta Hall, a disabled 46-year-old woman.
Disparate Nursing Home Care | The Chicago Reporter

Verdict in Abuse Trial

A Des Moines County jury awarded $600,000 in wrongful death damages Thursday to the estate of a Yarmouth man who died while living at the Danville Care Center nursing facility in 2009.
The decision of the five-woman, three-man jury was far below the $15 million attorneys representing the estate of Gene Bozarth requested during closing arguments Wednesday in Des Moines County District Court.
Nursing home neglect Attorneys representing the Bozarths and Health Care of Iowa, owners of the Danville Care Center, could not be reached for comment late Thursday afternoon. Jurors left the courthouse about 4 p.m. after seven hours of deliberations without commenting on the verdict.
Court officials said the request for $15 million in damages is the largest single request in more than 25 years in a civil trial in Des Moines County District Court. 
Jurors continue deliberations

Nursing Home Resident Murdered

The estate of an 82-year-old woman killed at a Rock Hill assisted living home last year is suing the home and two employees.
The Herald of Rock Hill reports the elder abuse lawsuit says the crime could have been prevented.
Pauline Cook was found dead in her shower in November at OakBridge Terrace. Her death came the day after she reported to staff and police that someone had been forging her checks.
Braquette Walton was arrested in connection with Cook's death. Police said the nurse's aide later confessed to killing Cook and trying to cover up the crime. Walton faces several charges including murder and burglary. http://www.sacbee.com/2012/08/23/4750873/dead-womans-estate-sues-rock-hill.html 

Read more here: http://www.sacbee.com/2012/08/23/4750873/dead-womans-estate-sues-rock-hill.html#storylink=cpy

Massachusetts nursing home worker charged with assault

An employee of a Massachusetts nursing home in Berkshire County is facing charges of trying to rape a resident.

The suspect pleaded not guilty Monday in Southern Berkshire District Court to charges of assault with intent to rape, assault and battery on a disabled person over 60 years of age and injury to a disabled or elderly person. He was ordered held pending a dangerousness hearing scheduled for Thursday.

Police say the 46-year-old certified nursing assistant at the Laurel Lake Center for Health and Rehabilitation in Lee, was arrested Sunday in response to a complaint from another employee that a disabled elderly woman had been sexually assaulted in her room.

Lee nursing home worker charged with assault - Boston.com

Nursing Home Employees charged

Prosecutors have filed drug-related charges against six employees at a nursing home in Sulphur.

The Oklahoma Bureau of Narcotics says the employees are accused of calling in fraudulent prescriptions to pharmacies to obtain painkillers, including hydrocodone.

Bureau spokesman Mark Woodward says there's no evidence any residents were deprived of their medications — only that the prescriptions called in were fraudulent.

http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/6-Okla-nursing-home-employees-face-drug-charges-3686252.php

Elderly woman assaulted in nursing home break-in

A team of detectives is investigating the alleged indecent assault of a resident at a New South Wales nursing home.

Police say a man indecently assaulted a woman in her late 60s after he forced himself into her unit at an aged-care facility at Jewells, near Newcastle.
They say the woman struggled and screamed and managed to scratch the man's face before neighbours came to her aid.
Police Inspector Sam Crisafulli says the woman is in shock.
"It is disturbing and these sorts of things always are upsetting to police officers and the public. It's a horrible thing to happen at that stage of your life," he said.
Police say the man is around 5 foot 6 inches, unshaven, and smelt strongly of cigarette smoke.
Elderly woman assaulted in nursing home break-in - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

Top brain specialist calls for ban on antipsychotic in elders

A senior neurologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center says many hospitals inappropriately use the antipsychotic Haldol "like water" in agitated elderly patients, putting them at risk for serious complications.
Dr. Louis Caplan, a neurology professor at Harvard Medical School, said a recent government report that found pervasive use of antipsychotic medications in elderly nursing home patents underscores the "overuse" problem with this class of drugs.
Caplan said Haldol is typically given to agitated patients to calm them quickly, but he said older patients, especially, can become over-sedated and stiff, putting them at risk for pulmonary and urinary infections, because they have trouble moving and couging.

"I would love to see Haldol banned from use in hospitals," Caplan said. "It has no role to play in hospitalized, agitated patients."
A report released this month by the Inspector General's Office of the federal Department of Health and Human Services found that 51 percent of Medicare claims for a newer class of antipsychotics, known as atypical, were prescribed inappropriately to nursing home patients.
The Inspector General reviewed medical records from 2007 and and found that 83 percent of Medicare claims for atypical antipsychotic drugs for elderly nursing home residents were associated with conditions not intended for that use. The report also found that 88 percent were associated with a condition that could produce serious side-effects, conditions for which federal regulators had specifically warned against such usage.
The use of such drugs is especially worrisome in nursing homes because a substantial number of residents suffer from dementia, a condition that puts them at greater risk of death when given antipsychotic medications.
The drugs were developed to treat people with severe mental illnesses such as schizophrenia, not dementia, which is the progressive loss of memory or other intellectual function than can result from aging or Alzheimer's disease.
Fderal regulators have issued nationwide alerts about troubling and sometimes fatal side effects when antipsychotics are taken by people with dementia, including increased confusion, sedation, and weight gain
Haldol is an earlier class of antipsychotic drugs, but Caplan said it's just as problematical.

Top brain specialist calls for ban on antipsychotic in elders

High Fall Rates Among Short-Stay Nursing Home Patients

One in five short-stay nursing home patients sustains a fall after their admission, and certified nursing assistant (CNA) staffing is associated with decreased fall risk, according to a study led by USC researcher Natalie Leland. The study recently was published in the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.
Though falls are unintentional, they hardly are insignificant: the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services reports fall rates as a quality indicator, and falls of nursing home residents have been associated with greater morbidity, mortality and health care costs.
Leland, who holds joint appointments at the USC Division of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy and the USC Davis School of Gerontology, and colleagues from Brown University analyzed the 2006 Minimum Data Set (MDS) assessments of all first-time Medicare and Medicaid patients admitted to a nursing home

USC-Led Study Analyzes Fall Rates Among Short-Stay Nursing Home Patients | USC News

Neglect is cited in nursing home death

A Red Wing nursing home neglected a resident in September when the man was placed in the wrong wheelchair, took a tumble and died from the fall, according to an Office of Health Facilities Complaints report made public Wednesday.

The resident of Red Wing Health Care Center had dementia and had a history of trying to get out of his wheelchair, which was fitted with a self-release seat belt and an alarm that sounded when the man stood up. A worker put the man in his roommate’s wheelchair one morning. Workers heard him fall and found him lying under the wheelchair. He sustained a neck fracture and a head wound and died at the hospital. The nursing home now places initials on wheelchairs and has told staff to read care plans

Neglect is cited in nursing home death | StarTribune.com