(State) Two Iowa nursing homes, Bishop Drumm Retirement Center in Johnston and Griswold Rehabilitation and Health Care Center, were recently added to a federal list of the nation’s lowest-rated care facilities, known as the Special-Focus Facilities list. Managed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), this program targets facilities with a history of serious quality issues for enhanced regulatory oversight to drive improvements.
The Griswold home spent 16 months on the eligibility list until it dropped off in April of this year. Last month, state inspectors visited the 31-resident facility and cited it for 17 violations – an unusually high number – although no fines were imposed or held in suspension.
The violations included mishandling of residents’ funds, inaccurate resident assessments, failure to meet professional standards, insufficient nursing staff, and inadequate infection prevention and control.
While inspectors were in the building, a resident complained about the lack of staff and noted that earlier that same day she had used her call light to summon someone to change her briefs and she had to wait four hours before anyone responded. She had to sit in her own waste for the full four hours, the woman allegedly reported.
In their written report, the state inspectors said one nurse aide stated that when the inspection team had arrived that day, “she was working by herself” in the home. The aide allegedly said “it is very frustrating to be the only staff and being paged by everyone.”
