Pennsylvania Nursing Home Abuse Attorney Blog

The family of 54-year-old Rodney L. Volkening of South Elgin, Illinois, has filed a lawsuit against Tower Hill Healthcare Center, a South Elgin nursing home, for negligence in Volkening's care, reports the Elgin, Illinois Courier-News. Volkening had spina bifida, a permanently disabling birth defect that, combined with his other medical conditions, left him in need of constant medical care.

Yet when Volkening was admitted to a hospital after his time at Tower Hill, hospital staff observed that he had not been receiving proper medical care at all. His colostomy bag had exploded and there was "a large amount of stool around" him, according to Volkening's family's attorney, Craig Brown. According to the lawsuit, Volkening had severe bedsores "that were covered by an old dressing covered by stool. He had a fever of 107 degrees with apparently no anti-fever medication being given to him at the nursing home prior to his arrival." "Because he presented to the emergency room with poor oral hygiene and poor skin care," Brown said, hospital staff suspected abuse and negligence at the nursing home and filed a report with the Illinois Department of Human Services.

Volkening's death certificate lists a staph infection and pneumonia as the causes of his death. While the family's lawsuit does not allege that the neglect caused Volkening's death, Brown said that they are investigating whether the nursing home's poor hygiene led to the infection that caused his death. Regardless of the outcome of that investigation, Brown and Volkening's family still intend to hold the nursing home responsible for failing to live up to its "statutory obligation not to violate the rights of any resident, including the obligation not to abuse or neglect any resident," as laid out in the state Nursing Home Care Act.

It is sad that nursing home patients and their families are unable to depend on the professional integrity of nursing home staff to ensure patients' health and safety. As a Pennsylvania nursing home abuse lawyer, I have seen many cases involving neglect that led to serious illness or wrongful death.

Continue reading "Pennsylvania Families Should Monitor Nursing Home Patients' Care" »

The Gary, Indiana Post-Tribune ran several articles recently about the demise of Northlake Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, a nursing home that was so consistently negligent in its patient care that the Indiana State Department of Health first suspended its license and ultimately issued an emergency closure order. As a Pennsylvania nursing home negligence lawyer, I was glad to read that authorities took action to save patients from being abused further, and I hope that the patients who were harmed are able to recover.

The Post-Tribune recounts a number of horrible instances of abuse at the nursing home. Mary Ann Jackson, 51, was at Northlake because she had suffered a stroke. She came to the nursing home with one bedsore, but during her stay, it spread to become a massive sore across her legs and buttocks. Jackson's sister said that when family came to visit her, staff members would bandage Jackson's sores to make it appear as if she was recovering, when in fact she was getting worse. "Nearly her whole behind was gone," said Shelli Jackson, Mary Ann's sister. "You could see the muscles and ligaments down to the bone. Her bedsores were so bad she was stuck in a fetal position with her legs glued together." A state inspection of Northlake found that the nursing home had failed to alert Jackson's doctor to problems such as her high blood pressure, heart failure, vomiting and significant weight loss.

After just one month in the nursing home, Mary Ann was transferred to a hospital and the family was advised that both of her legs needed to be amputated. The family refused and moved her to another hospital, where staff recommended that Mary Ann go into hospice care. The family chose not to follow this advice either. Miraculously, Mary Ann is recovering. "She's much better now," said Shelli. "Her minor bedsores are healing and she'll need skin grafts. She talks. She doesn't have renal or heart problems, but she's still struggling with the changes and she'll need wound care for the rest of her life. The good news is they said she'd be dead in a month and it's been four months."

Mary Ann finally transferred to Lawrence Manor Healthcare Center in Indianapolis. Rick Lipscomb, director of social services and admissions there, was horrified by Mary Ann's condition and said that he had never seen a case like hers in his 21 years in the field. "She had one foot in the grave," he said. "I don't know how she didn't die. I've seen animal carcasses on the side of the road that looked better than when she arrived here from another nursing home. ... People should go to jail for what happened to her." Sadly, Mary Ann's case was just one of many stories of abuse and neglect in the Post-Tribune's articles about Northlake.

Continue reading "Story Ends With Ray of Hope for Pennsylvania Nursing Home Neglect Victims" »

A legal case out of Chicago caught the eyes of our Pennsylvania nursing home abuse lawyers. The Chicago Daily Herald reported Feb. 25 that the former director of a nursing home is being tried for neglect and obstructing justice for her role in a scandal involving a nurse who allegedly euthanized patients. Penny Whitlock, 60, directed the Woodstock Residence Nursing Home during a series of suspicious deaths in 2006. Nurse Marty Himebaugh is accused in the case of "playing Angel of Death" by giving dangerously high doses of drugs to selected patients.

Himebaugh is accused of causing at least four deaths at Woodstock. At first, investigators thought these were "mercy killings," but state investigators later found evidence that she chose patients who she thought were difficult or annoying. Other nurses reported to Whitlock that Himebaugh was acting strange and once said she'd given a patient a cocktail so she wouldn't bother her during her shift. Himebaugh faces felony charges of neglect and possession of a controlled substance. Whitlock herself is accused of failing to follow up on those and other complaints, even allegedly saying Himebaugh could "continue to play Angel of Death." Both women face a maximum of three years in prison, and are also targeted by civil nursing home abuse lawsuits from victims' families.

Our Philadelphia nursing home negligence attorneys wish those families the best of luck pursuing justice from Himebaugh, Whitlock and Woodstock. From an earlier story, we learned that prosecutors have chosen not to charge either woman with murder because they're not sure they can prove that charge beyond a reasonable doubt. In cases like this, families may have no chance to hold wrongdoers responsible in the criminal courts. Instead, they can turn to the civil courts, where the standard of proof is slightly lower -- a preponderance of the evidence. This allows them a day in court as well as a chance to recover damages for the pain, suffering and expense of a severe nursing home abuse case.

Continue reading "Nursing Home Director Charged With Neglect for Ignoring Suspicious Patient Deaths" »

An article about trouble at a nursing home in North Carolina caught the eye of our Pennsylvania nursing home negligence attorneys. The Times-News of Burlington, N.C. reported Feb. 18 that opiates were found in the blood of several residents of The Britthaven of Chapel Hill nursing home, even though none had been prescribed an opiate drug. State officials planned to investigate. The home's parent company is also running its own investigation, and Chapel Hill police have already investigated and determined that no crime was committed.

The case started when a blood test for one resident in the Alzheimer's unit found opiates, despite no prescription for such a drug. (Several kinds of prescription painkillers contain opiates.) The news concerned the nursing home's staff, some of whom thought other patients in the Alzheimer's unit seemed sluggish. Testing turned up opiates in at least two other patients, who were admitted to a hospital. The first resident died of a case of pneumonia that the home's spokesperson said was unrelated. The head of the state's Division of Health Service Regulation said the incident was confusing, especially because no drugs were missing or misplaced at the home. However, he said, some antibiotics can create a false positive for opiates.

The nursing home was already getting extra inspections because of its poor record of care. Inspections in 2008 and 2009 found that certified nursing assistants didn't have enough time per patient to meet state standards. In November, the home also paid a fine for a water-temperature violation that investigators said could have led to an accident for a resident.

As Philadelphia nursing home abuse lawyers, we are surprised the police finished their investigation before the state started its own. If antibiotics are the culprit, it should be fairly easy to determine whether any of the residents who tested positive were taking such a drug. If that's not the case, state investigators -- and residents' families -- should look carefully for evidence of wrongdoing at the home. Alzheimer's patients can be difficult, and at some homes, this has led to misuse of sedative and antipsychotic drugs to control behavior. Opiates can have sedative effects, but they can also cause patients' breathing to slow and stop, putting their lives in danger. It also causes withdrawal when patients quit abruptly. Any evidence that opiates were misused at the home should cause swift and permanent changes to protect residents.

Continue reading "Nursing Home Residents Test Positive for Unexplained Opiates" »

As Philadelphia nursing home negligence attorneys, we were disappointed to see that nursing homes across the state are experiencing and expecting financial trouble because of the recession. The Lebanon Daily News reported Jan. 22 that nursing homes in the region are laying off staff members, cutting patient services or even closing. The problem is driven by the bad economy, which has resulted in cuts to Medicare and cuts or lack of growth on the state level. The issue is particularly important because 90% of Pennsylvania's nursing home patients are part of the Medicaid system.

According to one advocate for the elderly and disabled, Medicaid and Medicare are chronically underfunded in Pennsylvania to begin with. The funding cuts will make this worse, he said, as would the Medicare cuts included in the federal health care bill, if they pass. Homes shouldn't have trouble providing basic services, but he said they might end up cutting recreation and other quality-of-life services. Local homes told the newspaper that they were renegotiating contracts and looking for ways to cut costs without letting go of staff.

Our Pennsylvania nursing home abuse lawyers hope that's true. Adequate staffing levels, and low staff turnover, are an essential part of making sure nursing homes are safe and healthy places. When staff members are overworked, skilled nurses are absent or employee churn is high, details and even basic care are more likely to be overlooked. This can lead to serious cases of neglect or abuse at nursing homes, sometimes with tragic results.

Continue reading "Pennsylvania Nursing Homes Bracing for Medicaid and Medicare Funding Cuts" »

Our Pennsylvania nursing home negligence lawyers were disturbed to see a recent report suggesting some nursing homes have intentionally over-medicated their patients. The New York Times reported Jan. 15 that federal regulators have sued Johnson & Johnson for paying illegal kickbacks to a nursing home pharmaceutical distributor named Omnicare. The complaint in Boston federal court said Johnson & Johnson paid Omnicare to buy its products. Those products included prescription drugs like the powerful antipsychotic Risperdal, which is frequently used off-label to control behavior in patients with dementia. The Justice Department accused Johnson & Johnson of committing Medicaid fraud by inflating the number of prescriptions it paid.

Omnicare is a "middleman" that manages insurance issues, processes payments and distributes medications. The government alleges that it took illegal payments from Johnson & Johnson from 1999 to 2004. Among other things, the lawsuit says the drug maker paid for information previously distributed for free, and paid rebates every quarter based on Omnicare's success at switching patients to its drugs from competitors' drugs. These rebates are legal, but only if Medicaid gets the same discount as other large purchasers. The lawsuit says Johnson & Johnson tried to disguise its rebates to Omnicare in quarterly reports to the government.

As Philadelphia nursing home abuse attorneys, we wonder how many other companies may be guilty of similar behavior. Kickbacks are particularly dangerous in nursing homes because they encourage nursing homes to over-prescribe medicines. Some of these medicines may be appropriate, but they can also carry serious side effects. In fact, we wrote here last week about problems with the atypical antipsychotic Risperdal, which carries an FDA warning that it may increase the risk of death in elderly patients with dementia.

Continue reading "Drug Company Sued for Paying Kickbacks to Nursing Home Company Operating in Pennsylvania" »

As Philadelphia nursing home neglect lawyers, we were very interested in a new study published in the Jan. 11 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine. Researchers from the University of Massachusetts at Worcester found that in 2007, a disproportionately large proportion of nursing home patients received a drug from a class of drugs known as atypical antipsychotics. These drugs are indicated for mental illnesses like schizophrenia, but have several side effects serious enough that their use is now heavily restricted by the FDA. In particular, a 2005 safety labeling change warned that atypical antipsychotics may raise the risk of death in older people with dementia.

No drug is currently approved for controlling difficult behavior in patients with dementia, but atypical antipsychotics are widely used off-label for this purpose. This is despite the 2005 safety warning and the increased risk of stroke, diabetes, hyperglycemia and other side effects. Nonetheless, the study found that about a third of all nursing home patients in 2007 received the drugs. And one third of those patients had no diagnosis of mental illness or dementia. The scientists also found that patients were more likely to receive atypical antipsychotics after entering a nursing home that already had high prescribing rates. This may indicate a problem with "organizational culture," the authors wrote, and more studies should examine whether the practice has negative health consequences.

This is disturbing news, because it suggests that some nursing homes may be using dangerous, powerful drugs unnecessarily. The risks of atypical antipsychotics are so serious that another recent study found a 19% drop in prescriptions after the 2005 safety warning. Nursing homes who put their patients at risk of death or disability for no good medical reason are committing a form of nursing home abuse.

Continue reading "Study Finds Philadelphia Nursing Homes May Overuse Dangerous Antipsychotics " »

Our Philadelphia nursing home negligence attorneys were interested to see a news story about an outbreak of a rare disease at a nursing home. United Press International reported Jan. 14 that one resident has died and another fell ill at the Golden Hill Nursing Home in Kingston, N.Y. The two residents had Legionnaires' disease, a bacterial infection affecting the victim's respiratory tract. (Unfortunately, it gets its name from an outbreak at an American Legion convention here in Philadelphia.) The disease often leads to pneumonia and is considered a particularly serious threat to older people, people with weakened immune systems and smokers -- all common characteristics for residents of nursing homes in Pennsylvania.

The woman who died from Legionnaires' disease was 88 and had a compromised immune system, the article said. Another woman, 91, was hospitalized but has now been released. Legionnaires' disease takes up to two weeks to incubate, the article said, so staff members are watching other residents for signs of illness. The bacteria that cause the disease are not passed from person to person like the flu, but enter the body when the victim inhales infected water vapor. Health inspectors are examining the water system at the county-run home and will disinfect it when they find the source.

This incident raises serious concerns for Pennsylvania nursing home abuse lawyers like us. Legionnaires' disease is generally prevented by modern water treatment methods. An outbreak suggests that someone responsible for the water supply at this home -- the home itself, a government agency or an individual -- failed to follow established practices intended to prevent contamination and disease. If this is the case, residents who fall victim to Legionnaire's disease, and their families, would have a strong nursing home negligence claim.

Continue reading "Outbreak of Water-Borne Disease Near Pennsylvania Threatens Nursing Home Residents" »