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State
Inspectors Expose Abuse and Neglect
in Massachusetts Nursing Homes
published
in Rumbo 02/01/01
The State Department of Public Health (DPH) has cited 14
Massachusetts nursing homes for neglect and abuse
according to an investigation by Boston Herald reporter
Karen Crummy into DPH records. The state DPH records show
that nursing homes were negligent or abusive to elderly
residents in the following manner: life threatening
medical errors, elderly residents running away from the
homes without being noticed by the staff, physical
assault of residents, medical needs being ignored by
staff and nurses even after breaking bones and cases of
internal bleeding, staff throwing water on the faces of
the elderly to wake them up, dumping a bedpan of urine on
one woman’s head, high incidents of bedsores and
weight loss by residents and failure to seek medial
attention for two days after a man was burned by
defective equipment.
The nursing homes cited in the reports were the Danvers
Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, The West Roxbury Star
of David Nursing home and Alzheimers Center, The Natick
Brittany Health Care Center, the Saugus Hammersmith House
Nursing Center, the Braintree Elihu White Nursing and
Rehab Center, The Deadham Endicott Manor, the Canton
Meadowbrook Nursing home, The Framingham Kathleen Daniel
Home, and The Wilbraham Wingate facility. More than 200
incidents were documented by DPH in their reports and
labeled them as constituting "immediate
Jeopardy" for the residents of those homes.
Fifty other nursing homes were cited for substandard care
for their elderly residents. The Attorney General’s
office handles more than 225 cases of elderly abuse and
neglect in Massachusetts each year. According to the
Attorney General the numbers of incidents involving
nursing home abuse and neglect is rapidly climbing in the
Bay state. There are 127 open cases under investigation
for elderly abuse and neglect in Massachusetts nursing
homes.
Nursing home officials blamed the shortages of staff and
the quality of nurse training for the severe abuse and
neglect in their facilities. Some of the nursing home
spokesmen denied that the conditions exist and defended
their facilities. The local nursing home in Danvers, the
Danvers Nursing and Rehabilitation Center was
specifically charged not providing feeding assistance to
residents who were unable to eat on their own or needed
help. In Braintree, The Elihu White Nursing and Rehab
Center, a man was found unconscious after falling out of
bed two days in a row and dead four hours later of
internal bleeding in the head.
At lest one state law maker has made elderly abuse and
neglect a priority in the Bay State. Lawrence State
Representative Jose Santiago has filed a bill in the
legislature to force all nursing homes in Massachusetts
to provide air conditioning for their residents. The
climate control bill was cosponsored by all of the
Merrimack Valley law makers but one. North Andover State
Representative David Torissi said on WCCM’s Paying
Attention program last week that he would have to
investigate the cost of providing air conditioning to
seniors before he could commit to supporting the bill.
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