NEWS: Washington State fines Seattle nursing home

Seattle Post-Intelligencer, December 6, 2005

The state has fined a Seattle nursing home for allegedly failing to protect patients from abuse and neglect.

Keiro Nursing Home was ordered to pay $1,500 for failing to prevent, investigate and report suspected abuse of several residents. The home was cited for similar violations in August, according to the state Department of Social and Health Services.

After the investigation, the facility has held several staff training meetings, rewritten policies and reprinted employee badges to list the state's toll-free reporting number, said Steven Tracy, the facility's administrator.

"Some things can be taken out of context. (Still) ... we take full responsibility in retraining our staff," Tracy said Monday. "We certainly will train our staff to ensure our residents are getting the best care."

The findings of an October investigation by the state included:

Staffers failed to report to Washington regulators suspicions that a stroke patient with dementia was being slapped, shoved and verbally abused by a relative for two years. Employees documented 13 bruises between April and September this year, including one to her jaw, but did not report them to the state. Nursing assistants told investigators they didn't notify authorities because "everybody knew about it" and it "had been occurring for years." The state also found the facility's own investigation was insufficient.

The facility failed to adequately investigate suspicions of neglect after employees left a disabled resident for at least 10 minutes in the sling of a machine that helps transfer patients between wheelchairs and toilets, beds and other furniture.

Workers violated accident-prevention rules when using such a machine, possibly injuring at least one patient. DSHS said Keiro's investigation concluded that the arm fracture of a dementia patient with osteoporosis might have resulted in part from a single employee improperly performing a transfer, despite a care plan requiring it be performed by at least two employees.

Tracy largely declined to comment on the details of each of those allegations. However, he said it was too speculative to assume the patient was injured by the transfer in the third incident.

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