We were the only close family members and carers to our Mother. She fell at this facility due to unsafe apparatus and during our investigations which took 5 weeks to Xray Scan our Mother our Mother was given 30-day notice to leave. We realised that this perhaps was not the right facility to accommodate our Mother so requested a medical evaluation to find her a more suitable medical facility to reside. After two days of receiving this notice we were informed our Mother could stay there but we were no longer permitted to ask questions relating to our Mothers caring and our POA status taken away, leaving our Mother with no person as her POA of caring. This effectively leaving our Mother in a vulnerable position to predatory acts. What action can be taken in this situation please? The Director of facility refused to explain why this situation occurred and I have since written to the head office Ensign who initiate that Desert View Senior Living Las Vegas have been compliant. I am not sure giving an elder 30 days notice because we were investigating a fall is compliant and the removal of our POA status legal, especially when DVSL confirmed our Mothers confusion numerous times. Should a safety inspection be carried out due to unsafe apparatus not fit for purpose of use to aid elder persons?
This sounds like something that needs reporting to at least the county if not the state.
There are several possibilities, but the most obvious one that springs to mind might be that you didn't, as a matter of fact, have POA status. The facility had been liaising with you as your mother's nearest family members, but once the fall happened and the investigations began it came to light that you had no formal authority and the facility was therefore prevented from giving you information.
This would be true unless your mother had, while competent, given you power of attorney or made you her health proxy on a formal basis. At the very least, you would need HIPAA authorisation for medical information to be shared with you.
However. The fact that you're not entitled to information (if that is the case) does not mean that nobody is. Your state will have regulations and inspection procedures in place, monitoring safety in facilities and investigating incidents that are reported to them.
So get in touch with those regulators and report the incident; and meanwhile take advice on formalising your status as your mother's representative. If your mother is no longer able to create a POA or appoint a proxy, you may have to apply for guardianship.
Thanks for your response. Our Mother divulged she fell by being washed, she could not stand alone she was completely wheelchair bound following her hip surgery. She would call us everyday complaining of pain and it is when the facility started to get annoyed with us. The family failed to tell us of the fall, in fact they did not know the fall happened, until we called to complain.
We did contact Elder Care when we were informed HIPAA had been signed by our Mother. They could not divulge information, they just said that they had visited her. The facility however, did divulge the name of the inspector who went to see them and seemed to understand that the protection officer was satisfied everything was well and our Mother was happy, we were completely confused by this result. We had our Mother complaining and on the other hand everyone was telling us all was well?
Our Mother is sadly no longer here she died and from what we understand she had started to starve herself and became socially distant, this indicates depression and unhappiness. Sadly, we were not aware of the level of confusion until after she died when people volunteered information to us, those persons being long-term friends of our Mother and outside of her supporters. We believe in order to stay at the facility, she was given a choice at this time she was exhibiting behavioural problems and the declinging level of confusions came to light after her death so guardanship is no longer required. Where do we go from here to address this and stop this happening to anyone else?
Do you cause disruption at the facility? They can deny you access.
Everything was fine until we asked for a medical evaluation when Mom fell after her hip surgery and starting to show signs of confusion and it became more difficult to make contact with her from afar England where we are based for work reasons. The email thread I have looked through seems to be that that facility were 'discriminating' us for being international. We had an international contact in Las Vegas who at first the facility questioned allowing her information to assist us to care for our Mother. Our Mother was able at first to use her iPhone and we would FaceTime and make contact often, but it would seem that the staff became Moms 'best friend' during her stay. When the fall occurred we started to question this is when things became difficult. We were in the process of talking to nursing facilities because our Mother had diabetes, she had edema in her legs seeping our body fluids, progressive kidney disease, her blood sugars were high and she was showing signs of depression after our POA status removed she ended up in ER. We were unable to obtain medical information about our Mother any longer. We asked our Mother what had occurred and she was fearful to disclose any information to us. Once our POA status removed and the facility obtained a HIPAA we reported to Elder protection in Las Vegas because our we were fearful of leaving our Mother alone. Elder protection and the facility reported back to us that she was fine and happy.
In addition to filing complaints with entities other posters have already identified, add the State's licensing department and Medicare. I honestly don't know what Medicare's role is in senior living, since they're not medical facilities per se, but it wouldn't hurt to spend some time learning what Medicare can or can't do. Others here are probably more knowledgeable on this issue than I.
But I would first, and ASAP, find another place for Mom, although you might try to have a meeting and discussion of the issues in an attempt to restore a good working relationship, all the while hunting for another facility.
This may help:
https://www.medicare.gov/what-medicare-covers/what-part-a-covers/what-are-my-other-long-term-care-choices
To my knowledge, only the individual creating a proxy POA relationship can revoke it, or perhaps an intervening legal authority such as a judge. If the POA has a law firm listed on its "pleading paper", contact them and ask if there are circumstances under which a facility can override POA terms. This isn't necessarily to negotiate with the facility, but rather to add to your complaints to governmental agencies.
And document everything, including all the actions to date and any future conversations you have with this outfit.
BTW, did you do any background checks on this senior living facility?
I didn't much, but there is one interesting comment from a current employee here:
https://www.indeed.com/cmp/Desert-View-Senior-Living/reviews?fcountry=US&floc=Las+Vegas%2C+NV
And a mandatory step: contact the Admins ASAP (see the contact info at the bottom of this page) and ask them to remove the name of the facility from the post. There are libel issues that could come into play.
Good luck.
What you are seeking to establish is that this person exerted "undue influence" or that your mother was of diminished capacity due to dementia and was incompetent to revoke and assign a new POA.
You need a certified eldercare attorney who does litigation in the state of Nevada. Your complaint is against this person, not the facility. They did not revoke your mothers POA.
We are unsure of the situation, from what was revealed to us by our Mother is would seem she did not want this to happen, but was manipulated into a situation to prevent her having to move whilst in a disabled and frightened state.
What would you do if you had been caring for your folks all your life and suddenly were told you could not be the carers any longer and were not permitted to ask questions about your parents health and wellbeing whilst you were investigating an accident in the facility that had not been reported to you by them but by your Mother? We were approached voluntarily by those concerned about our Mom? Persons were initiating concerns in correspondence to us from Nevada over supporters surrounding her were being manipulative and overly trying to help at the end of our Moms life. This information was divulged to us by persons involved in care at the facility too.
Our Mom declared in a confused state by a friend who was supporting her in historical correspondence at the start of assisting us with her caring, correspondence from the facility themselves to state that our Moms confusion was worsening, whilst aiding her to change her POA of caring and signing a HIPAA. We have all written evidence to back our claims. This really is not about financial, this matter is more about making people aware of the things that can happen and asking others opinion of POA status to someone you have been caring for for many years.
Our questions relate to the conduct of the facility and the carers assisting our Mom the last Eleven months of her life who would in the end not find her adequate nursing facility to live where her needs would have been met and the obstruction by the facility for not allowing us to pursue the appropriate medical facility for our Mom by telling her she could not stay if we were her POA of health, withdrawing her 30 day notice once our questioning of her health could not be questioned under HIPAA law. POA status means very little if you cannot protect your elder of harm. The facility manipulated a situation where your parent was imprisoned under their caring regardless of the consequences to the elder and to the family.
Is that what happened?
It must have been very hard for you taking second hand info all those months. But it IS second hand info and this may make your fight even more difficult.
I am thinking maybe the center didn’t know who your mother’s POA was OR they did but the supposed POA was not interested enough to go and see what was going on. And at that point, the facility took over? Did they get guardianship?
It sounds like your mom’s needs were too much for an AL to handle and she needed a higher level of care. Assisted Living is just that- meals, med management (if the resident requested and paid for that service), laundry, housekeeping. Not 24/7 supervision.
I am sorry this happened to your family but to go back and prove all of what you are saying you will need to hire an elder attorney who has the resources to investigate and look over mom’s medical records. Not sure if you are even able to request the med records easily but if you are next of kin and can prove it the attorney will know how to proceed.
What is your objective at this point? I am not sure what your goal is.
Sure you can contact the government agency that regulates the AL facility your mother was at & report the case which may prompt an inspection. AL is not as regulated as memory care or SNF, however. Some are not required to even have an RN on site. Residents are deemed to be independent enough to need minimal assistance.
It sounds like your mother was doing well there, had a fall, needed more supervision on discharge but SOMEONE said it was ok to discharge mom back to AL. At this point SOMEONE needed to step up and say nope, mom needs rehab first or mom needs more supervision before she can return to that status. The POA she had, the distant friend, didn’t step up at that point. Is this correct?
What a rabbit hole!
Hire an elder care attorney.
Do you think it's possible that MIL had developed dementia and complained of pain to you and not to staff? My mother did this frequently.
My mother also frequently imagined things were happening in her facility when they were not. Floods, people having sex in bathroom, union strikes. She told us once that she could no longer have showers because she would have to stand.
None of this was true.
It sounds as though the family friend was anything but.
This “POA” is the person at fault here for not taking her responsibilities seriously.
A lot of “he said she said”. Eldersafety, It’s over. Let it go. I realize you are grieving and angry but the circumstances were such that your mother was left at that center a vulnerable adult and that’s probably why the center took legal action. Someone had to.
I remember from your last post that you appointed someone as POA for your mother and that person lost interest or did not follow through on important issues while having POA for your mother. You weren’t sure that person was dedicated enough to your mother’s care when you appointed her, if I recall correctly and had real doubts.
Many of the difficulties you are having is that you are international and it appears no one in the US wants the responsibility of POA.
Perhaps when her facility had trouble either getting in touch with her POA (who rarely responded) or her family in England (you) they found since no one would step up to the plate and make decisions that needed to be made immediately the facility felt that your mother had essentially been abandoned so they went for POA/guardianship when your mother had immediate needs.
I can’t remember if it was you who wrote the scathing review on the internet or if that was a different poster, but if it was you, the center can possibly sue for libel.
It may be time to schedule a trip out there from England to the center in Nevada to find out exactly what is going on. Or speak with an elder care attorney and pay for a consult as your situation is complicated with her being in the US and you across the ocean. I don’t know how easy that will be during Covid thus if I were you I would look at options. Airlines are still flying.
It’s time for boots on the ground, so to speak. You are getting your info from every other source but from Desert View, thus all your facts are second hand. You can’t even request a copy of your mother’s medical records can you? You can if you get a lawyer after determining if you have a case for elder abuse which imo you do not.
The center has their ducks in a row. You said they came to one discussion with a myriad of “evidence” proving the assigned POA was lax in her response to their needs.
It’s very hard managing senior care even when you are living close to your mother & nearly impossible if you are a continent away, as you are finding out. Did the facility go to court to get guardianship?
My guess is that DV noted that there was no one local to make hard and immediate decisions about your mother in an emergency too many times and no one responded. (Not the POA in Nevada you appointed). Senior care centers often need to make decisions on a dime if an acute injury or situation occurs. They took steps to assure someone can make those decisions as the situation was not safe.
I'm not arguing with you. I'm trying to clarify your very confusing posts.
And yes, you can be sued for libel.
Hire an eldercare attorney if you want to litigate.
My statements are true and not false as I said, I would not post things if I could not back them up with evidence. The public have a right to know what occurred and how this situation came about for public safety. This is a true experience, effecting persons involved with this establishment. We cannot cover up these kinds of actions, when the reviews for such facilities will not allow you to write the truth. These experiences need to be exposed so that others do not fall into this trap who have dedicated theirs lives to caring for their folks and loved-ones.
I would also urge persons to fully investigate someone you choose to be a contact in care for a relative, because even if they have a professional standing in the community, this does not mean that they are absent of predatory acts.
Finally, I do not feel as though you are arguing with me, this forum is for discussion and opinions and asking others for their advise is helpful. Most of the responses I have received have been most helpful. I feel as though your answers have been most helpful too - thank you.