Compliance Perspective:
The Compliance Officer should review with the QAPI Nurse and the Compliance Committee the facility’s policies and procedures regarding the visitation rights of residents, including those setting forth any clinically necessary or reasonable restriction or limitation or safety restriction or limitation that the facility may need to place on such rights and the reasons for the clinical or safety restriction or limitation. Staff will be educated on documenting and reporting incidents involving family members who are suspected of abusing, exploiting or coercing a resident. The Compliance Officer will ensure that any reported incidents involving the abuse, exploitation or coercing of a resident will be investigated, and if substantiated, determine the appropriate response together with the Compliance Committee.
A Michigan Hospital Complex has filed a lawsuit against three family members of a 94-year-old patient. The lawsuit claims “defamation, tortious interference 
and invasion of privacy” against the patient’s two daughters and a granddaughter that occurred regarding the medical care provided to the patient.
The granddaughter was asked to remove a critical Facebook post she made criticizing the care that her grandmother received and the way that she and the two sisters were treated by hospital staff. Her main complaint was that the hospital had forbidden the family from visiting the patient while she was receiving care. The post has received over 1,200 shares and almost 600 comments. The granddaughter has refused to remove the Facebook post and the granddaughter’s mother even picketed outside the hospital.
In the lawsuit, family members are alleged to have “verbally abused the patient, ignored the dietary restrictions in place for her, withheld meals from her, instructed her not to take her medications, provided unauthorized vitamins to her; and, verbally abused and even threatened hospital employees.” The suit also claims that the three women have interfered with the hospital’s ability to conduct business and have presented the hospital in a false light to the public. The lawsuit follows months of discord between the family members and the hospital staff regarding the patient’s care.
After documenting numerous incidents, the hospital said that the patient’s family was forbidden from visiting the patient or trespassing on the hospital’s property unless they needed emergency medical treatment. At one point the granddaughter was physically removed from the premises by a sheriff’s deputy.
Through the lawsuit, the hospital asks the granddaughter to “delete the Facebook post and issue a public retraction;” and it calls for the family members to stop picketing with ‘critical messages.’”
Since filing the suit, the hospital has transferred the patient to another healthcare facility near another of the patient’s granddaughters who share legal guardianship with the independent court appointed co-guardian. The woman is reported to be doing well in the new location.
Meanwhile, hospital officials confirmed they transferred Eleanor Pound to another care facility.
