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Where to find good nursing home care?

Feb 25, 2010 | ERIN CALANDRIELLO | Courier News

As 84-year-old John DeBias of Carpentersville sits in his wheelchair clinging to his daughter's puppy, he also tries to cling to a good quality of life in a nursing home.

A few years ago, at his condo in Florida, DeBias' health started to slip, so he moved back home to Carpentersville with his daughter, Karen DeBias.

He gradually got weaker. He'd fall when going to the bathroom and would burn food and pans when cooking in the kitchen.

About five months ago, John broke his leg and suffered a heart attack during surgery. He no longer could rely on his daughter and in-house health care, leaving him at the hands of a nursing home.

It wasn't his daughter's first choice. But between running a full-time pet sitting business and raising kids as a single mom, she couldn't keep up with all of her father's needs.

Since January, John has been in and out of nursing homes and hospitals throughout the Fox Valley area.

One local nursing home worked out. But some of them made Karen feel that "the elderly weren't dying of anything -- they were dying a slow death from neglect at nursing homes."

Karen said some of the nursing homes "put on a good horse and pony show, but the elderly wind up fending for themselves when it comes down to it."

Inadequate care at one local nursing home, Karen said, left her father with a range of problems including a weight loss of 13 pounds in two weeks, urinary tract and yeast infections, a shoulder injury from the pushing and pulling of his body, dehydration, malnutrition, pressure sores, pudding smeared across his face, and his head in his food tray because no one helped him eat, and low blood sugar levels.

The Illinois Department of Public Health confirmed her concerns. In May, Karen filed several complaints with the IDPH against that nursing home. The state agency hit the nursing home with several citations, from having showers too hot at 93 degrees Fahrenheit to endangering patients' health.

Karen's father is not alone.

In 2003, state Long Term Care Ombudsman programs nationally investigated 20,673 complaints of abuse, gross neglect and exploitation on behalf of nursing home and board and care residents, according to the National Long Term Care Ombudsman Resource Center, an agency in Washington, D.C., dedicated to improving lives of long-term care residents.

Among seven types of abuse categories, physical abuse was the most common type reported.

Currently, national legislation has been proposed to further protect the elderly from nursing home neglect.

Info, fines, audits

The Nursing Home Transparency and Improvement Act of 2008 "aims to bring more transparency to consumers regarding nursing home quality, improve enforcement, and strengthen nursing home staff training requirements."

The act seeks to achieve these goals through means including:

• Providing nursing home ownership details, a standard complaint form and links to inspection reports on the federal Nursing Home Compare Web site, www.medicare.gov.
• Require improved reporting of staffing information so people can compare homes.
• Increase fines from the current cap of $10,000 to up to $100,000 for a deficiency resulting in a death.
• Independent audits of nursing home chains, narrowing in on companies that own homes in multiple states. It would allow the government to challenge nursing home chains that have poor compliance histories.

Aside from the proposed legislation, a five-star rating system of the nation's 16,000 nursing homes is expected to be available on Medicare's Web site by the end of the year. The system will be based on government inspection results, staffing data and quality measures.

Illinois assistance

Illinois already has a comprehensive source to evaluate nursing homes, and it can be found on IDPH's Web site at www.idph.state.il.us/healthca/nursinghometestjava.htm. A consumer can access information about nursing homes, ranging from violations to the process of selecting a facility. Illinois is one of only six states providing such comprehensive information online for evaluating nursing homes, because it's not mandated by the federal government.

The state also has "Illinois Long-Term Care Ombudsman Program," which serves to protect and promote the rights and quality of life for people who reside in nursing homes. An ombudsman's primary job "is to make sure that when a person enters a nursing home, they don't lose their rights they had at home," said Tonya Banks, an ombudsman for Kane, Kendall and McHenry counties. Nursing home residents "have the right to a quality life."

She works to ensures this bar is met by informing residents and their families of their rights; resolving complaints; providing information on residents' needs to their families, facility staff and their community; and advocating for good individualized care.

Banks said that when selecting a nursing home, a person should make an unannounced visit to the nursing home "to get a feel how things really work." She said to also consider meeting with the administrative staff; be on the lookout for foul smells and inadequate lighting; access its annual reports, which include any violations; and, most importantly, "to go with your gut feeling if this nursing home is a place that wants you or your elderly parent there."