Advocates push for registry of abusive nursing home workers

By Beth Musgrave – bmusgrave@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — Mary Haas took her mother out of a local nursing home last year because she was concerned about a staff member who treated her mother poorly.

When the same staff member showed up at the new nursing home, Haas went to administrators. She told them that she suspected the woman of abusing residents in the past.

“I don’t know for a fact that she was fired from the other nursing home, but I had concerns with her. I don’t know why she left that job,” Haas said.

Neither did the woman’s new employer, but a new proposal would make it easier for nursing home administrators and others who provide services for the impaired to know more about the people they employ.

Currently, there is no way for an employer to know if an employee has been found guilty of abusing an adult unless that employee tells them, a glaring hole in the protection of adults, advocates say.

Senate Bill 128, sponsored by Sen. Perry Clark, D-Louisville, would require the Cabinet for Health and Family Services to make available to employers a database of employees with a history of substantiated cases of abuse or neglect.

The measure cleared a Senate committee earlier this week and his headed to the full Senate for a vote.

Darla Bailey, president of Kaleidoscope, a day treatment program in Louisville, said providers typically do criminal background checks and check the nurses’ registry, a database of nurses who have been convicted of wrongdoing, when someone applies. But many of the people who provide hands-on, day-to-day care to clients aren’t nurses.

Two different divisions inside the cabinet investigate abuse and neglect of adults. If either agency substantiates abuse or neglect on a person, that person would go on the registry. Even when abuse is substantiated, it doesn’t always mean there will be criminal charges filed, advocates say.

“It’s a protection for providers,” Bailey said. “There are a lot of really good people who work in this field. But there are some bad apples.”

Haas, who works as a volunteer for the Brain Injury Association of Kentucky, has two siblings with serious brain injuries who need specialized care. Her brother, whose brain injury was caused by encephalitis, has been abused by caretakers twice in the past, Haas said.

“We have some wonderful people but then again there are those other folks out there that can prey upon the elderly or impaired adults,” Haas said. “I couldn’t keep two dollars in my mother’s wallet at one nursing home because it would get stolen.”

On Tuesday, the Senate Committee on Veterans, Military Affairs and Public Protection unanimously passed the measure. Still, it will likely face some opposition from state officials.

Vikki Franklin, a spokeswoman for the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, said the cabinet supports the intent of the legislation. But because of the state’s anemic budget, it can’t support the program.

“We agree fully with the intent of the legislation, but, because there would a significant cost associated with implementing the legislation, the cabinet cannot support it in the current budgetary environment,” Franklin said.

Bailey said even if the measure doesn’t pass this year, she is hoping that the legislature will agree to do a study to see how much such a registry would cost. Some are also concerned that there is no appeals process in place for employees who think the substantiated case of abuse or neglect is unjust.

Still, some sort of screening is needed, Bailey said.

It’s frightening that it is not know how many people currently working with vulnerable adults may have abused or neglected an adult in the past, she said. “My goal is to break this cycle.”

Filed Under: Featured • KY General Assembly • Social Services