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NEWS & LETTERS,
AUGUST-SEPTEMBER 2003
Nursing home abuse
Chicago--People usually try to prepare for events such as
funerals, education, promotions, but few of us plan for the time when we are
elderly or incapacitated. Some senior citizens have life insurance policies, but
they didn't plan on being sick. Many of them fall prey to the corporate machine
of the nursing home industry which will eat up most of their income and
resources. The problem is not that most of the income of seniors and
others is taken, but the fact that many are given inferior services, sometimes
by uncaring staff. At many nursing homes, patients with Alzheimer’s disease or
other mental incapacitations wander unsupervised. A patient might have a seizure
and collapse foaming at the mouth and bleeding with no help in sight. Sometimes
defecation is not cleaned up promptly from the floor. I have seen housekeeping
staff reuse dirty water to mop floors. The most despicable thing about the nursing home industry
is the attitude of dehumanization produced in some of the staff after they’ve
been there awhile. There are excellent staff people in the nursing home
industry, too, but some staff people talk to patients as if they were dogs. If
they holler in pain from bed sores they will be ignored and their problem not
treated. At one nursing home a staff member who was delivering
snacks dropped a cookie on the floor. His co-worker said to throw it away. He
replied, as he put it back on the table, “They don’t know the difference.” His statement summed up for me the attitude of the
institution that is supposed to care for our sick and elderly. Many are
disabled, have no families or friends who are able to care for them, are sick,
poor, and can’t take care of themselves. Some are at a point where they
don’t really understand what’s going on around them. Mistreatment of such
people is unacceptable! There needs to be action taken when the sick and elderly
become the oppressed. --Akili |
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