Report finds NY nursing home inspectors underreport bedsores

The Long-Term Care Community Coalition has issued a report assessing the performance of the New York Department of Health (DOH), which is responsible for nursing home quality and safeguarding residents.

The report found that the DOH issued fewer than 100 citations a year for inadequate pressure ulcer care of the more than 9,000 residents with unhealed wounds. When the state does issue a citation, it rarely finds that the resident was harmed, according to the report. Other DOH areas studied in this report included antipsychotic medications and staffing levels

Descriptive charts to allow for easy comparison between states as well as specific insights into DOH’s performance in New York are available in the report.

Recommendations to improve the DOH performance include:

• a recommitment to its mission as an enforcement agency,
• compliance with federal survey agency requirements,
• improvement of its resource allocation by dedicating its resources to fostering oversight and
• improvement of performance assessment and training.

“Fundamentally, our approach is predicated on the idea that it is the resident [who] is important, not the facility. The public, including (and especially) residents and families, does not generally care whether a facility is meeting a certain standard because they care about the facility but, rather, because they care about the safety and well-being of the people in the facility,” the report says.

Related article:

Report examines state survey agency performance

Sandra Hoban

Sandra Hoban was on I Advance Senior Care / Long-Term Living’s editorial staff for 17 years. She is one of the country’s longest-serving senior care journalists. Before joining Long-Term Living, she was a member of the promotions department at Advanstar Communications. In addition to her editorial experience, Sandi has served past roles in print and broadcast advertising as a traffic and talent coordinator.