Articles Posted in nursing home abuse

A Broward County husband-and-wife have been sentenced to seven years behind bars, following their jury conviction in March for exploitation of the elderly.

Our Hollywood elder abuse lawyers know that the pair could have faced up to 30 years in prison.

The case highlights an all-too-common phenomenon of elderly financial abuse, something to which many seniors are vulnerable.

In this case, the married couple, the husband 48 and the wife 52, befriended a 94-year-old woman in their Hollywood neighborhood. They then convinced her to allow them to take on the role of her financial advisers. The wife may have been especially convincing, as she worked as a stock broker.

However, rather than responsibly managing the elder woman’s finances, they attempted to swindle her out of her $10 million estate.

Witnesses say the two convinced the older woman to disinherit beloved family members. Later, she was lured into turning her money over to them.

The woman was reportedly suffering from dementia. Like many others her age, she lacked the capacity to make sound decisions. The couple knew this, prosecutors said, and marched her over to an attorney in order to have her alter the will to include them in it.

However, the woman’s son was more vigilant than the pair anticipated. He had been tracking his mother’s financial status, and contacted police when he found that the two were essentially helping themselves to anywhere from $500 to $5,000 at a time.

In all, the couple were reportedly able to trick the woman – and her elderly sister – into handing over $100,000 to them. They then put themselves in a position to receive more from the inheritance, once the woman died.

Defense attorneys had attempted to argue that the elder woman’s deposits were genuine displays of both appreciation and affection for the two, for whom she had grown to care after developing a deep personal bond.

Thankfully, the jury wasn’t buying it.

Sadly, cases like this are far from isolated, even if the victim doesn’t have a multi-million dollar estate hanging in the balance.

Financial exploitation is every bit as abusive as a physical wound. It robs a person of their dignity, their independence and all too often, everything they have worked so hard for. One person’s greed can leave them destitute.

Recognizing this type of abuse can be a bit tougher. There are no bruises or scars. Relatives or loved ones may not think to closely follow their elderly loved ones’ finances because they assume there is nothing to worry about, particularly if he or she is a resident at a nursing home.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office released a study last year indicating that in 2010, the cost of older adult financial exploitation in this country cost nearly $3 billion annually.

Perhaps the best line of defense in these cases are friends and family members who remain watchful and unafraid to follow up and press for more details.

It can be difficult to spot, but some of the potential indicators could include:

–Your elderly loved one seems to be strongly influenced by a friend or relative or nursing home caregiver. Be mindful that this individual could be trying to get control of the elder person’s finances, while keeping them in a passive role.

–You notice sudden changes to your loved one’s individual financial accounts or life insurance policies.

–You become aware that accounts belonging to your elderly loved one now have joint account holders or authorized signers.

–A caregiver at any point requests access to bank accounts or other assets – including as a condition of providing care.

–You take note of a sudden change in your older loved one’s individual financial status or the account activity.

–Your elderly loved one has recently made changes to property titles.

–Your older loved one has new financial arrangements about which they seem unable to explain or just generally confused about.

–You notice a lack of personal care in terms of hygiene or in other areas, despite the fact that his or her financial means would suggest the standard of care should be elevated.
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The country’s largest assisted living home chain with ties to Florida recently lost a $23 million lawsuit in which the California plaintiff was found responsible for neglect and abuse of an elderly person.

Our Fort Lauderdale nursing home abuse lawyers understand that at the heart of this case was the fact that the facility had accepted responsibility for the care of this elderly female dementia patient, despite the fact that her physical condition was far too deteriorated for staff at the facility to handle from the onset.

In Boice v. Emeritus Corp., filed in October of 2012, the family alleges that the woman’s life was left in the care of a small group of workers who were overburdened and not properly qualified or trained. It was inevitable under these circumstances that the end result would be tragic.

The case resulted in the second-largest punitive damage award in the state of California last year – $22,963,943.81. Those last two numbers – 81 cents – was the victim’s age, in pennies. Jurors said they did not want the facility to ever forget the victim, or what had happened.

As we have written about before in our Florida Nursing Home Abuse Lawyer Blog, for-profit facilities like this one are far more prone to reports of abuse and neglect. While every facility has to keep the bottom line in mind in order to continue functioning, for-profit facilities exist solely for that bottom line.

Emeritus is a national chain, with 483 facilities in 45 states, including Florida. In total, there are 30,200 employees, with 20,500 of those full-time. Total resident capacity is approximately 51,000, with about 30,000 of those in assisted living, 7,000 in memory care and 4,600 in independent living.

The average monthly payment at one of these facilities is about $4,100 – per resident – and those revenues have increased 6.5 percent in 2012. While a $23 million verdict against a nursing home might sound sizable, consider that revenues last year for this firm were $1.57 billion.

This case does not mark the first time this facility has been in trouble.

In Florida, a case out of Orlando in 2010 involved three residents who were found to have severe, painful late-stage pressure wounds. Under state law, their advanced physical disabilities should have warranted a move to a skilled nursing facility much sooner. Had this happened, these wounds might not have progressed to the point they did.

In Texas, an appellate court in 2011 upheld a case where $135,000 was awarded to the executive director of the facility who was forced to resign after filing a complaint regarding personnel cuts that left her with an inadequate number of staffers necessary to provide proper care for patients.

The case out of California involves a lot of the same kind of complaints. For example, several years before this incident occurred, a nurse for the facility penned a five-page letter to top executives for the company, stating that the shortage of staff was a huge problem, and nowhere near enough to cover the quality of care that the company advertises. Namely, the shortage of medical techs, resident assistants and housekeepers was of major concern.

Executives never responded to that letter. The nurse resigned several days before the woman who was the subject of this case moved in.
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A nursing home in Ormond Beach was fined $36,000 for the reportedly poor way it handled allegations of sexual abuse involving an employee against a patient.

Our Coral Springs nursing home abuse lawyers know this is a fairly substantial fine, considering that the most serious offenses will typically involve state fines of approximately $40,000. Initially, the facility was given a $45,000 fine, but that was later settled for the lower amount.

According to media reports, a resident of the home reported to administrators back in January 2012 that an employee of the facility had climbed into bed with her roommate. She couldn’t indicate whether anything beyond that had happened, but suffice it to say, such action is egregiously inappropriate, a violation of patient rights and likely a red flag sign of serious misconduct, if not criminal sexual assault or battery.

It does appear the nursing home conducted a cursory investigation by subsequently interviewing the alleged victim. However, that individual denied that anything had happened.

In a typical investigation, we might understand why this would lead to a dead end. However, in a nursing home setting, we don’t know whether the patient is fully cognizant and aware of surroundings and what may have occurred. It could very well be that the roommate is more aware of the truth than the actual victim – which would make sense from the standpoint of a sexual predator searching for a vulnerable target.

But the nursing home did not press on with its investigation. The bigger issue is that it did not properly report the incident to criminal investigators or social services, as required by law.

Regulators only found out about the allegation following a regular inspection. Failure to correct this type of issue, the state reported, was likely to cause serious impairment, harm, injury or death to residents.

The facility, which has 133 beds, was subsequently placed on both state and federal watch lists for a series of violations.

Most recently, inspectors conducted an investigation of the home’s practices back in February. They found a whole host of deficiencies, which included:
–Deficient infection control practices;
–Inadequate food;
–Excessive medication errors.

Despite this, the nursing home is rated by the federal Nursing Home Compare site as “above average” in terms of both quality and staffing.

However, the health inspection rating is marked as “much below average,” which resulted in the facility having an overall score of 2 out of 5 stars.

Sexual abuse in nursing homes is one of the most under-reported crimes. You can’t always count on an alert roommate or staffer to alert you to when something is amiss. Even if your loved one is mentally sharp, he or she may be afraid to reveal the truth.

Uncomfortable as it is, it’s important for all relatives and loved ones to recognize the potential signs of elder sexual abuse.

Those might include:
–An unexplained venereal disease or genital infection;
–Torn, bloody or stained underclothing;
–Bruises around genitals or breasts;
–Unexplained anal or vaginal bleeding;
–Withdrawal from normal activities, a sudden change in alertness and a sudden depression or loss of interest in things once enjoyed.
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A 68-year-old registered sex offender was arrested recently after reportedly sexually assaulting a quadriplegic man at a Florida nursing home.

He is facing a single count of lewd and lascivious battery of an elderly or disabled person, a second-degree felony punishable by up to 15 years in prison, per Florida Statute 825.1025.

Our Deerfield Beach nursing home abuse lawyers know that the presence of registered sexual offenders in Florida nursing homes – and therefore the instances of sexual assault or abuse – has increased markedly in recent years. Nursing home facilities have a responsibility to take adequate precautions with regard to these residents, to ensure that others are kept safe from their advances.

Such action is critical, considering that many nursing home residents lack cognitive or physical abilities, which makes them particularly vulnerable to both neglect and abuse.

Sexual abuse in nursing homes is perhaps the least detected, reported or acknowledged type of abuse that occurs in nursing homes, and yet, thousands of cases are estimated to occur each year.

In this case, which took place in a suburb of Tampa, it was an employee of the center that witnessed the abuse and reported it to authorities. It’s possible similar incidents occurred in the past with this individual, but probably went undetected.

Affidavit reports indicate that the abuse involved the perpetrator coming to the victim’s bedside and fondling him against his will. As a quadriplegic, he had no means to retreat. The suspect reportedly admitted his actions to investigators.

The suspect had been on probation through last spring, and there had been no reports of him violating that while he was being supervised.

Nursing homes that fail to take action to protect residents against one another – especially when one is a known sex offender – could face hefty fines and penalties. Case in point is a facility in Oklahoma, which was recently fined $1.3 million by the state’s health department. Inspectors noted repeated and unaddressed issues with regard to protection of patients from sex offender residents.

In particular, one patient had been diagnosed with intellectual disability and was a registered sex offender with a prior felony conviction. Despite awareness of this fact, the facility chose to admit him and then took no actions to monitor his interactions with other patients. There were multiple reports of “increasing sexual inappropriateness” in touching both male and female patients. In particular, this individual was targeting other residents who were either blind or paraplegic, with investigators noting that the problems had progressively been getting worse.

Yet the nursing home had done nothing.

In situations such as this, it is often recommended that the offender have one-on-one supervision. As you can imagine, this kind of staffing could get quite expensive, and therefore, many facilities may choose to simply overlook it. However, this means that other residents are put in danger.

In addition to the fine, the state health department ordered a denial of payment for new Medicaid and Medicare admissions, as well as a $900-a-day fine until other deficiencies were corrected.

This is a rare situation in that state investigators have clearly identified the issue and are taking a hard line to address it. Unfortunately, that’s not always the case.

If you suspect your loved one has been a victim of sexual abuse in a nursing home, contact us today.
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Florida lawmakers are seeking to significantly curb plaintiffs’ rights to sue negligent nursing homes, recently advancing the SB 1384, despite the testimony of a woman whose elderly mother was brutally sexually assaulted in 2002.

Our North Lauderdale nursing home abuse lawyers recall this decade-old case, as it revealed significant flaws in the protections that many nursing homes had in place to halt patient-on-patient violence.

The woman’s mother was helpless in her room as an 83-year-old male patient wheeled himself into her room, blocked the door and proceeded to brutally sexually assault her. At no time did a staffer intervene.

As it turned out, that same man had multiple prior convictions for sexual assaults, including molestation of a child and sexual assault. That was back in the 1960s, and he spent less than four months in jail total for both offenses.

Still, the nursing home would have found those prior offenses had they screened for them. Families who trust the care of their loved ones to this facility should know whether convicted sex offenders are residing there.

Prior to his placement at the nursing home, a judge in Gainesville had determined he was a potential danger to himself and others – which is why he had been ordered to stay at the nursing home in the first place.

Police later arrested him for the assault, but a judge found him incompetent to stand trial and he was instead sent to a state hospital.

The victim died a short time later, though of unrelated causes. A jury later awarded her family $750,000 from the nursing home for its negligence, but her daughter says that amount was never paid.

Senate Judiciary Chairman Tom Lee, a supporter of SB 1384, said that while he sympathized with the situation, he doubted this measure would have done anything to have changed it.

He’s wrong, of course. Although the punitive damages were never paid, they would have been a lot harder to get in the first place had this bill been around at the time when this woman’s family took the nursing home to court.

Originally, the bill would have made it nearly impossible to sue the corporate parent of a nursing home for damages. Amid fierce opposition, that portion of the bill was eventually struck, a move the sponsor says was a begrudging compromise.

Now, SB 1384 deals almost exclusively with the issue of punitive damages, requiring that plaintiffs would have to undergo a pre-trial hearing before a judge to prove the validity of certain pieces of evidence before the claim could go forward.

As the bill’s supporters put it, it would require clear documentation of intentional wrong-doing or gross negligence, as opposed to merely he-said-she-said. Of course, this overlooks the fact that oftentimes, some of the most compelling testimony in nursing home abuse or negligence cases comes from witnesses – people who lived, worked and visited there.

As it already stands, a 2001 change in the the law requires that half of all nursing home-related punitive damages have to go into a state trust fund. Why are we depriving those who have been wronged of a chance to see justice served?

In effect, this measure creates a disincentive for plaintiffs to make a claim for punitive damages in the first place, and that of course appears to be the primary goal.

One has to wonder for whom these lawmakers are working in the first place?
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A pair of bills – one in the Florida House and one in the Florida Senate – would make it more difficult for you to sue a nursing home that abuse or neglected your loved one, even in cases when that abuse led to serious injury or death.

Our Indian River County nursing home abuse lawyers are appalled that lawmakers would push to further strip the rights of those who have suffered so much already.

It’s not enough that not less than two years ago, our state leaders reduced nursing home staffing hour mandates, with direct nursing care requirements dipping from 3.9 hours weekly to 3.6 hours weekly (nursing assistant care hours dropped from 2.7 to 2.5 hours). At the time, nursing home unions warned that the erosion of this measure had the potential not only to result in higher turnover rates, but to endanger lives as well.

Of course, those original staffing mandates were the whole reason that the state agreed to cap liability damages for nursing homes back in 2001. Those mandates have been eroded, but the cap has remained in place. In other words, the nursing home got its cake, and ate it too.

Now, we have SB 1384 and HB 869.

SB 1384, introduced by Sen. Bill Galvano (R-Bradenton), states that a claim for punitive damages in a nursing home litigation case could not be brought unless there was a showing of admissible evidence, proffered by the parties. It would require that a special hearing be held before trial during which time the judge would have to find “clear and convincing evidence” that a specific person or corporate defendant actively and knowingly participated in either intentional misconduct or engaged in conduct that constituted gross negligence, which in turn contributed to the loss, injury or damages suffered by the claimant.

Punitive damages, as you may know, are those damages that exceed simple compensation and are instead awarded to punish the defendant for its conduct.

The way the law is right now, plaintiffs need to produce the evidence before trial in a simple pre-trial hearing. However, plaintiffs aren’t required at that time to prove prior to trial that the evidence is admissible. Essentially, it creates a whole other barrier to compensation

The other measure, HB 869, is along those same lines. It specifies the conditions under which the nursing home resident (or relative) has cause of action against either the management company or licensee. It requires a basis for punitive damages be determined by a judge prior to trial.

Galvano was recently quoted as saying that the goal is to test the veracity of the claims before these claims go forward. He stressed the ability to seek punitive damages wouldn’t be taken away, though he fails to note it would be a lot more difficult to obtain. The fact that our Bradenton State Senator is unabashedly more concerned about the welfare of large nursing home corporations that he is about the care of the elderly residents of his district, should tell you all you need to know about his priorities.

It’s worth noting that these measures are staunchly opposed by the AARP and the Florida Alliance for Retired Americans, a spokeswoman for the latter saying, “Never in my life have I ever seen anything more offensive to old people than this.”

Essentially, these measures serve as a means to shield big corporations and abusive individuals from accountability when they have harmed an innocent and vulnerable patient. Both measures are alive and well, with the HB 869 now in the Health Innovation Subcommittee and SB 1384 now in the Health Policy Committee.

Our Indian River nursing home abuse attorneys urge everyone reading this to contact your senator or representative or those in the committee and subcommittees, and voice your clear opposition to these measures.
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A jury in California recently awarded the family of an 83-year-old Alzheimer’s patient a sum of $23 million in punitive damages for elder abuse and wrongful death.

Our Palm Beach Gardens nursing home abuse lawyers applaud the victory. Amid a heart-wrenching tragedy, we hope that her loved ones will find some peace in knowing that her story has helped to shed light on a pervasive and too-often silent issue that affects elderly patients across the country.

According to local news reports, the trial lasted several weeks, but jury deliberations lasted less than a day. Ultimately, the jury found that the nursing home facility, a corporation based out of Washington State, acted not only with malice, but also with oppression and fraud in the way that staffers treated this woman.

The retired schoolteacher had been transferred to the facility just three months before she died. By the time she passed away, her body was covered with at least four pressure sores that had become badly infected. She had also lost a substantial amount of weight.

Attorneys hired by the woman’s three children said there were some nights at the facility that staffers weren’t present in her ward at all, despite assurances that she would be receiving around-the-clock care. A resident nurse at the facility was reportedly aware of the sores the woman had incurred shortly after her arrival, but that nurse allegedly instructed aides not to let anyone know about them.

When the woman entered the facility, she was able to move around with the aid of a walker. Less than two weeks into her stay, she fell and was never able to get up again. Her most serious pressure sore developed on her backside from so much sitting in a wheelchair.

As you probably know, bed sores, also known as pressure ulcers or pressure sores, are injuries to the skin and the tissue underlying that are the direct result of prolonged pressure on the skin. They can develop anywhere, but they’re most commonly seen on bony areas of the body, such as the buttocks, hops, ankles or heels.

Nursing home residents – especially those with forms of dementia – are at high risk because they tend to be less mobile, unable to change positions on their own and not necessarily able to inform caregivers when sores have become especially large or painful.

But it falls on the caregiver to know. It falls on the caregiver to make sure each patient is moved frequently to prevent these sores from developing in the first place. And if the sores do develop, it falls on the caregivers to recognize and swiftly treat them.

Although pressure sores can manifest rather quickly, they can be very tough to treat – which is why early detection is so important. A pressure sore will not get better on its own. A registered nurse advising staffers to ignore it would have known that she was condemning this woman to unbearable pain and a rapidly deteriorating quality of health.
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When ProPublica announced its updated version of Nursing Home Inspect 2.0, media outlets across the country took full advantage of the massive amount of data that had been compiled from the Freedom of Information Act release.

Our Oakland Park nursing home abuse attorneys understand that local media in Missouri, Tennessee, New Jersey and Ohio have been combing through the federal nursing home inspection reports to learn how facilities in their area stack up. They aren’t coming up empty-handed.

The information was culled from inspection reports collected by the Department of Health and Human Services for Medicaid and Medicare Services. As we reportedly recently in our nursing home blog, the ProPublica database not only lists the number of deficiencies cited in each report, it also lists the amount of money penalized nursing homes were made to pay.

Reporters in St. Louis found that more than 500 nursing homes across the state had been fined nearly $700,000 since 2009 for deficiencies,while nearby Illinois racked up nearly 775 fines topping $2.3 million.

Among those deficiencies was a patient who died after suffering 12 hours of chest pain, during which nursing home staff failed to provide him his blood pressure medication or inform the attending physician of the situation. Another report detailed an incident in which a dementia patient was able to wander off during breakfast, and wasn’t found until the next day – in the nearby creek, where he had drowned. There were also reports of staffers launching into verbal tirades against patients, calling them “retarded” and other workers who said they had to be “treated like children.” Additionally, there were substantiated allegations of sexual assaults on at least six patients at a single facility by a worker who was hired shortly after his release from federal prison.

In New Jersey, the data revealed nursing homes where dispensing medications which weren’t properly documented, and patients were demeaned with verbal abuse and moldy, outdated food was served to residents.

In Nashville, reporters learned a single nursing home was fined nearly a quarter of a million dollars following the death of a patient whose rapid decline, including symptoms of high fever, swelling, abnormal breathing and paleness, weren’t reported to the on-staff doctor. That patient died the next day.

In Mansfield, Ohio, a nurse was fired and a nursing home fined after she reportedly restrained an elderly patient in his bed by tucking him in tightly in the sheets, even though he had indicated he couldn’t breathe. He had refused oxygen, and she reportedly taunted the man by asking if he was “getting hot under there.” Luckily, he survived.

In Pennsylvania, reporters discovered that an 83-year-old man who was taken to a nursing home for two weeks of rehabilitation following heart surgery went from being active and playing golf to dying a few months later. His death was largely attributed to the fact that while in the nursing home, he was restrained to his wheelchair, the call bells he used to signal for help were routinely disconnected. Rather than walk him to the restroom, they made him wear diapers that they failed to frequently change, causing sores and rashes. He eventually developed pneumonia as a result and died soon after.

ProPublica is to be applauded for its efforts to reveal these kind of widespread instances of abuse, neglect and negligence, and we hope other media outlets will join in the effort to spread awareness.
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Sometimes when we talk about improper restraints involving nursing home patients, people’s thoughts immediately go to images of leather straps and people being left unattended for hours.

And make no mistake – that happens.

But our Boca Raton nursing home abuse lawyers know what is far more common is chemical restraint. This is essentially the overmedication of a patient in order to make him or her more compliant, easier to deal with. Not only is it unethical and illegal, it can be deadly.

That was the case for a woman in Chicago, who died in January 2011. In a civil lawsuit recently filed by her family, her doctors are accused of prescribing medication combinations and doses that were inappropriate and which directly led to her death. The family further posits that the nursing home was negligent in administering those incorrect doses to their mother, and that the nurses on staff failed to properly monitor her condition.

Her family is seeking a minimum of $200,000.

We can’t say whether this case would qualify specifically as “chemical restraint,” and sometimes it can be difficult to tell the difference between this and an overdose. In either case, the nursing home and doctors may be negligent.

Chemical restraint cases often involve dementia patients, as did the recent criminal case out of California. The state attorney general there referred to what occurred as “convenience drugging” in a release announcing the three-year prison sentence received by the director of nursing at a facility in Kern County.

According to the release, nearly two dozen elderly residents were given psychotropic drugs at the behest of the nursing director, not for therapeutic reasons, but rather to “quiet and control them for the convenience of the staff.” These were all Alzheimer or dementia patients who were deemed particularly prone to wandering, noisy, argumentative or frequently complained.

As a result, all 23 suffered some negative effect as a result, and in three cases, it was determined, their deaths were hastened.

It took years for the investigation to yield results, as it first began in 2007 following an ombudsman complaint after he personally witnessed a patient being forcibly held down and injected with a psychotropic drug. Had that not occurred, we might never know about any of it.

Although these cases are incredibly common, they are rarely pursued criminally, so the case out of California really sets a good benchmark.

Still, this is by no means a new issue. The New York Times ran an article back in 2008, detailing this ongoing and pervasive problem. That coverage began with the daughter of an 88-year-old woman believing she was losing her mom to dementia. As it turned out, she was losing her to overmedication.

The elderly Bronx woman was plagued with confusion and anxiety as a result of her condition. Doctors at the nursing home prescribed her a mix of antipsychotics and sedatives. Her condition worsened, and she began to suffer vocal tics and twitching. She only improved when her daughter recognized what was happening and demanded she go off them.

Back when that article was written, sales of newer antipsychotics like Zyprexa, Seroquel and Risperdal had shot up from $4 billion in sales in 2000 to more than $13 billion in 2007 – and it’s only continued to grow, in big part due to use in nursing homes.

In fact, researchers have estimated that about one-third of all nursing home patients are given antipsychotic drugs, and this is despite the fact that studies have shown that the vast majority of Alzheimer’s and dementia patients do not benefit from their use.
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ProPublica, a nonprofit investigative news organization, late last month unveiled the updated version of its nursing home database, Nursing Home Inspect 2.0.

Our Coral Springs nursing home abuse lawyers know that choosing a nursing home and then following up on that facility is tough – especially if you aren’t sure where to look. We laud this effort as providing one more tool to aid in this critical endeavor.

The news agency first revealed the site back in August, but the updated version boasts a database with information on federal fines slapped against some 15,000 nursing homes in the country. Although the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has its own, recently-launched Nursing Home Compare site, the ProPublica site makes this information more readily accessible and also provides in-depth analysis with visual aids that put the confusing mass of information into perspective.

Those who visit the site are able to search either by facility, state, deficiency or issue of concern, such as sexual abuse or nutrition or falls. They can also access detailed information about how certain assisted living facilities did on inspection reports during the three years prior.

Additionally, the site shows you how serious and commonplace certain violations were, and whether the nursing home was ordered to pay a fine.

In Florida, of 682 nursing homes, 45 were found to have serious deficiencies. In the last three years, Florida nursing homes have paid nearly $5 million in penalties (which is nothing, when you consider this is a multi-million dollar industry). Another 23 homes were penalized by having new admissions payment suspended.

In Coral Springs, a nursing home on Royal Palm Boulevard is noted to have deficiencies in the following areas:
–The development of policies that would prevent mistreatment, neglect or abuse of residents or theft of residents’ property;
–Provide necessary services and care to maintain the highest standard of well-being for each resident.
–Store, cook and serve food in a clean and safe way;
–Have a licensed pharmacist review each resident’s medication and report any irregularities to the attending physician;
–Maintain drug records and properly mark and label drugs according to accepted professional standards.

What’s great about the site too is that it tells you, specifically, what occurred for the facility to have obtained the deficiency, how widespread each violation is within the facility and how serious it is. In this case, none of these violations reached the most serious range, but only because no one was actually seriously hurt. The potential, however, was certainly there.

All total in Florida, some 9,250 violations have been reported in all.

The average fine in Florida was reportedly $18,000, though there was a wide range from a few thousand dollars to several hundred thousand dollars per case.

Another thing that this site points out is the disparity in some of these cases. For example, a nursing home in Central Florida had 27 deficiencies over the course of three years and was fined a total of $135,000. But meanwhile, another nursing home nearby had 30 deficiencies of basically equal severity – and has paid no fines at all.

The disparity is even greater state-to-state. The average national fine is $11,400. In Florida, it’s $18,000. In Washington state, it’s $90,400. In Washington D.C., it’s $4,500.

What this tells us is that even simply looking at the state and federal reports alone won’t give you an entirely accurate depiction of conditions in a given facility.

The sad fact is you won’t be able to predict or prevent every incidence of abuse or neglect. But through extensive research and ongoing vigilance, you can certainly try. Our Coral Springs nursing home abuse lawyers are committed to fighting for the rights and protection of your loved ones and all those who reside in Florida nursing homes.
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