Why can't nursing homes take good care of our family members? The corporations which own these facilities are making plenty of money. Is there a good reason why they cannot spend some of that money on patient care?
The latest sign of the times comes from West Virginia. The estate of woman who died from injuries sustained in a Dunbar nursing home has filed a lawsuit against Sunbridge Care and Rehab and the Sun Healthcare Group, Inc., seeking compensatory and punitive damages. According to the suit, the resident, Ferris McCarty, was admitted to Sunbridge Care and Rehab in January 2006, at the age of 79. Upon her admission, McCarthy suffered from dementia and could no longer handle her affairs. Her cognitive and physical skills were impaired.
The suit alleges McCarty suffered serious injuries as a result of multiple falls, weight loss, dehydration, malnutrition, constipation, a perforated bowel, and infections. The suit alleges that these injuries lead to her death on August 10, 2006, a mere 8 months after her admission. Sure these allegations have to be proven...but I bet they will be.
My open challenge...let's hear from someone who will defend the nursing home's care of Ferris McCarty!
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
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3 comments:
It will be interesting to see who can defend this case! SUN killed my mother EVELYN CALVERT in a Sunbridge Newport Beach Calif facility and they settled with me out of court. They also used my attorney to threaten me in mediation and I sued him for malpractice -he died 2 weeks later. The corporate climate at SUN is toxic.
It has been said that the true character of a people is shown by how they treat their most vulnerable: the very young, the sick, and the old. By that standard, the richest country in the world looks positively vicious for its treatment of the sick and the old compared to the "undeveloped" and "underdeveloped" countries I have been to. In those places, the old and sick do not have shiny high tech equipment or the latest cure all from Big Pharma or a trained nurse let alone a doctor to attend them. But the sick have someone there all the time to give them water or a bit of food, to turn them or adjust a pillow, to listen or talk or just sit with them. The old are treated with respect, provided good and often the best food as well as first choice of what other comforts are available, and listened to for their wisdom. Yes, of course, people die younger and often of easily curable diseases in those places. But what value is there in living longer if your pain is magnified by neglect and isolation? If your caretakers are under-trained, under-respected, underpaid, and so overworked they can't give your the care they know you should have? If you can be "transferred" away from family and friends without warning on the "business decision" of some faceless, nameless corporate bureaucrat? If you are little but a profit source to be discarded without compunction, even some relief, when you "underperform"? Better, I think, a shorter life with some dignity than a longer one as a mere commodity. If we are at ease treating old and sick people, at least those not among the plutocrats, as commodities who's whole value is profitability, why not set children to labor (including sexual labor --good profit there) and harvest the organs of the sick? No, no, we couldn't do that, we value life! That reply reminds me of an Oscar Wilde story. Seems the wit leaned over to a handsome young lady at dinner to ask if she would sleep with him for a million pounds; when she readily agree he asked if she would sleep with him for ten pounds; "what," she cried, "do you take me for a whore?"; Oscar replied, "we've settled that matter already; we're just haggling over price." Americans have settled the matter that we are already greedy souls. We're just working out how to maximize profitability. Sad
What about the workers in nursing homes. They face abuse everyday. Workers are told they have no rights. We are told without resident's, we don't have a job. Without us who take's care of them. If nursing home's closed where would they go? Where would we go when we get older?
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