Nursing home owners charged with homicide

[jazz lady]

Agreed. According to the article they knew and still declined.

Yes, they did and IMO they should be charged as their decision to NOT evacuate was directly responsible for the death of their patients.

 

[itsbob]

The Nursing Home Administrator I can see, but not the RN's or others on the nursing staff. They have little or no power and cannot make those decisions. My sister is Director of Nursing for a nursing home and she has little authority to make any decision about patients other than ensuring they are getting the care they need while in the facility and that there is sufficient staff on hand to care for them. She is known to go around to the staff's homes when it is bad weather and pick them up so they can make it into work.

RN's make ALL of the decisions as far as patient care goes.. and at night, they are IT!! There are no administrators in the building after say 5 PM, the RN's get paid the big bucks to assume that kind of responsibility. Cases of Tornadoes, Hurricanes.. T-Storms.. they decide where the patients go, what to do with the staff etc.. there should be plans in place, but if something out of the ordinary happens on their shift, it is their responsibility to make the decisions.. I wasn't there, but would bet the administrators nor the owners were there when it got the point of having to leave the patients on their own.. and there were no phones or electricity at the time to be able to call and ask for input. Somebody made the decision to abandon them, someone AT the facility.

 

[bresamil]

Yes, they did and IMO they should be charged as their decision to NOT evacuate was directly responsible for the death of their patients.

I wonder why there is no information on the administrator being charged, unless the owner is the administrator. My sister worked in a private nursing home on the outskirts of Baltimore. The owner was also the administrator in that facility. Maybe its the same in this case.

 

[jazz lady]

RN's make ALL of the decisions as far as patient care goes.. and at night, they are IT!! There are no administrators in the building after say 5 PM, the RN's get paid the big bucks to assume that kind of responsibility. Cases of Tornadoes, Hurricanes.. T-Storms.. they decide where the patients go, what to do with the staff etc.. there should be plans in place, but if something out of the ordinary happens on their shift, it is their responsibility to make the decisions.. I wasn't there, but would bet the administrators nor the owners were there when it got the point of having to leave the patients on their own.. and there were no phones or electricity at the time to be able to call and ask for input. Somebody made the decision to abandon them, someone AT the facility.

Sorry, RN's do NOT make big bucks (at all!) to make that sort of decision and CAN'T. That is why the administrators are on call too. I know - I've heard her call them often enough because she CANNOT do certain things without their permission. I'm going to ask my sister what she would have done in this situation and how much authority the nursing staff would have to move patients in this sort of situation, especially since the owners decided not to close the facility. I'll let you know what she says.

The final decision to move the patients rested on solely on the shoulders of the administrators/owners of the facility. They KNEW the storm was coming and had been warned repeatedly, but made the decision to NOT close the facility or get them out of harm's way. What would you have had the nursing staff do? Circumvent their decision and move the patients using their own vehicles? No one knew exactly what was going to happen but the potential for disaster was high and close to a certainty. It will be interesting to see if they can find the staff of the nursing home and get their version of what happened.

 

[itsbob]

Depending on where you are, and in relation to what you do.. RN's DO make big bucks.. they make a lot more then say a Teacher.. or a truck driver.. or a social worker.

RN's around here can make anywhere from 30 to over 50 an hour.. LPN's after just 9 months of school, make between 20 (as a staff nurse) to over 35.. That's GOOD money... And some make GREAT money just working two days a week.

 

[jazz lady]

Depending on where you are, and in relation to what you do.. RN's DO make big bucks.. they make a lot more then say a Teacher.. or a truck driver.. or a social worker.

RN's around here can make anywhere from 30 to over 50 an hour.. LPN's after just 9 months of school, make between 20 (as a staff nurse) to over 35.. That's GOOD money... And some make GREAT money just working two days a week.

Ah, but we're talking about NURSING HOME RN's, not ones that work in a hospital. THEY make the big bucks, especially if they specialize in emergency or ob/gyn care.

I know what my sister makes and it isn't ANYTHING compared to the amount of time she puts in and the stuff she puts up with. It's at the lower end of the scale you have for RN's and that's after 25+ years and being the DIRECTOR of nursing.

 

[Lenny]

Someone please tell this biatch to STFU!

The updated Louisiana death toll was released as Gov. Kathleen Blanco lashed out at the federal government, accusing it of moving too slowly in recovering the bodies. The dead ``deserve more respect than they have received,'' she said.


However, Federal Emergency Management Agency spokesman David Passey said the state asked to take over body recovery last week. ``The collection of bodies is not normally a FEMA responsibility,'' he said.

This woman must be having 'female troubles' keeping her from thinking straight. I bet Qpid would nominate Kathleen Blanco as a textbook nominee for president of the U.S.

 

[Qpid]

This woman must be having 'female troubles' keeping her from thinking straight. I bet Qpid would nominate Kathleen Blanco as a textbook nominee for president of the U.S.

She cried too much for me on t.v.

the president of the united states can't do that

 

[itsbob]

if LPN's are making 25 in Nursing Homes.. RN's (at least BSN, not sure how ASN's would relate) should be making at LEAST 35 in Nursing Homes.. and DON.. I would think should be at least 65 - 75k a year. if not, someone is being taken advantage of, and should ask for a raise!!

 

[jazz lady]

I emailed my sister and asked how much authority does the Director of Nursing (D.O.N.) and the RN's have in the case of an emergency and what would/could you have done in this situation? She replied:

It is mandated by Federal Law that you have an evacuation plan and contracts with outside authorities on where you would send your patients if, in fact, you needed to evacuate. The D.O.N., in the absence of the Administrator, has the authority to order the center to evacuate. These people had no plan. That nursing home surely was not the only one is New Orleans! However, it appears they were the only ones simply left. There have been reports that some nursing assistants stayed
behind until the bitter end trying to help some of those people.

I then asked her if the owner of the nursing home said to stay open, can the administrator or D.O.N. simply decide to evacuate anyway? Her response:

Once the State gives the order to evacuate, your plan goes into
effect. THE OWNER WAS WRONG AND SHOULD BE PROSECUTED. I would have
started the evacuation.

So there are reports that the nursing staff tried to stay with their patients until the end and then had to save themselves. It appears the nursing home also had no evacuation plan even though it is a Federal requirement. If this is true, that is enough for prosecution of the owners for homocide.

If anyone has any questions you'd like to ask my sister, I'd be happy to bug her for you since she's at work and I have a captive audience.

 

[jazz lady]

if LPN's are making 25 in Nursing Homes.. RN's (at least BSN, not sure how ASN's would relate) should be making at LEAST 35 in Nursing Homes.. and DON.. I would think should be at least 65 - 75k a year. if not, someone is being taken advantage of, and should ask for a raise!!

I'm confused if you're talking about per hour for each one. If so, based on your $25 per hour for LPN's, they'd be making around $50k and at $35 for RN's would be around $70k per year. The DON is then DEFINITELY underpaid at $65 to $75k.

Anyway, this has really nothing to do with this story. The bottom line is that nurses are WAY underpaid for all that they do and how tough their job is.

 

[BuddyLee]

The owners REFUSED HELP!!!

Check out the story on msnbc....

That help was supposedly offered on many occassions.

 

[jazz lady]

The owners REFUSED HELP!!!

Check out the story on msnbc....

Here's the link for that article:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/9337631/

There's a lot more detail:

The Manganos had an evacuation plan as required under state law, both their attorney and the attorney general said.

But Foti said the nursing home had a contract with an ambulance service to evacuate the patients, but the owners didn’t call the company. They also turned down an offer from St. Bernard Parish officials who asked if the nursing home wanted help evacuating, he said.

According to this, they DID have a plan but refused to enact it nor take the help that was offered from other sources.

Foti declined to say if the Manganos remained at the nursing home throughout the storm or if they fled before it struck Aug. 29.

I'll bet my bottom dollar they fled while leaving their patients to die.

 

[itsbob]

The second quote is waht I was talking about.. They can't evacuate themselves.. they have to depend on an ambulance service.. How many ambulances did their Parrish have? Where were they? Probably evacuating hopsitals and the like.. prioritizing who they were going to evacuate first.

In our counties, how many TOTAL ambulances do we have? How many have contracts similar to the one above for evacuation of our nursing homes and hospitals? If the WHOLE county is effected where do the limited number of ambulances go?

If the Mayor and Governor called for an Emergency Evacuation when they were supposed to, or when they were ASKED to, the ambulances could have got more people out..

If it's true some aids were there until the better end, I would hope like hell the nurses were there too!

 

[vraiblonde]

They both look evil. Hang 'em.

 

[Bustem' Down]

The second quote is waht I was talking about.. They can't evacuate themselves.. they have to depend on an ambulance service.. How many ambulances did their Parrish have? Where were they? Probably evacuating hopsitals and the like.. prioritizing who they were going to evacuate first.

In our counties, how many TOTAL ambulances do we have? How many have contracts similar to the one above for evacuation of our nursing homes and hospitals? If the WHOLE county is effected where do the limited number of ambulances go?

If the Mayor and Governor called for an Emergency Evacuation when they were supposed to, or when they were ASKED to, the ambulances could have got more people out..

If it's true some aids were there until the better end, I would hope like hell the nurses were there too!

Where were the families. I'm not saying that these people are not to blame, but I can't imagine not helping my grandmother in a situation like that.

 

[jazz lady]

The second quote is waht I was talking about.. They can't evacuate themselves.. they have to depend on an ambulance service.. How many ambulances did their Parrish have? Where were they? Probably evacuating hopsitals and the like.. prioritizing who they were going to evacuate first.

In our counties, how many TOTAL ambulances do we have? How many have contracts similar to the one above for evacuation of our nursing homes and hospitals? If the WHOLE county is effected where do the limited number of ambulances go?

If the Mayor and Governor called for an Emergency Evacuation when they were supposed to, or when they were ASKED to, the ambulances could have got more people out..

If it's true some aids were there until the better end, I would hope like hell the nurses were there too!

The ambulances can't respond to evacuate the patients IF THE OWNERS DON'T CALL THE COMPANY they've contracted with to do it. They never even GAVE them the chance to get the patients out of harm's way. THAT is the point. Other hospitals and nursing homes managed, so why couldn't they?

I'd really, REALLY like to know where the owners were when all this happened. That in and of itself to me would be very telling.

 

[bresamil]

Where were the families. I'm not saying that these people are not to blame, but I can't imagine not helping my grandmother in a situation like that.

I would definitely have gotten my Dad myself, but he is not on any life support other than oxygen, and we have tanks. I probably would've taken anyone else I could get to as well. If I would be unable to care for the ones I'd help to evacuate, then I'd go to a hospital outside the storm path as quickly as possible with them. Of course its probably easier play hero in my mind - I wasn't there - but I can't imagine letting those people stay when there were ways available to get them out.