Failing to provide initial employee training on how to properly respond to residents and additional training after an incident occurs may result in the submission of a false claim due to provision of substandard quality of care.
Compliance Perspective – Attempted Suffocation
Policies/Procedures: The Compliance and Ethics Officer with the Administrator will review policies and procedures for training provided to employees at hire and on an ongoing basis.
Training: The Compliance and Ethics Officer with the Administrator will ensure that staff are trained at hire regarding how to respond to concerns about a resident’s behavior and what they are to do after an incident occurs.
Audit: The Compliance and Ethics Officer with the Administrator should personally conduct an audit by interviewing newly hired employees about the initial training they received and randomly interviewing other employees about ongoing training they have received related to incidents that have occurred.
Staff Sensitivity Towards Residents
On July 25, 2016, staff in an Alabama nursing home called the police to report an incident of abuse against an elderly resident. The police responded by interviewing witnesses who confirmed that an employee, Zekiah Dunn, had become agitated, made threats, and then attempted to smother a resident because he was concerned that she would awaken other residents due to repeatedly calling out. Fortunately, the resident was not seriously injured.
Police investigators arrested Dunn at the nursing home where he was working as a certified nursing assistant (CNA). He was charged with attempted murder for allegedly trying to smother an elderly resident and was taken to the county jail where and held on $50,000 bail.
Dunn later pleaded guilty to a lesser misdemeanor charge of elder abuse and is currently serving a prison sentence.
Recently, the family of the resident who was abused filed a lawsuit against the facility. The attorney representing the plaintiffs explained that the lawsuit is based on two areas of speculation: that the facility was short-staffed at the time of the incident and that the nursing home had not provided adequate training when the CNA was hired and did not train staff regarding reporting the CNA’s actions after the incident occurred.
An arbitrator has been assigned to the case with a hearing date to be set soon.
