The Mount Royal Towers nursing home, located in Jefferson County Alabama, will be hit with about $250,000 in fines for serious violations over almost six months. Mount Royal Towers avoided losing federal funding by reaching substantial compliance with federal requirements by June 15th beating a deadline of June 16th. Over a period of about six months, Mount Royal’s nursing home operation couldn’t get federal or state funding to take new patients because of continual problems. California-based Health Care Group, which owns the nursing home, says the company is appealing the fines which were recommended by the federal Centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services.

In December 2006, the facility was cited by state Department of Health authorities for putting patients’ health and safety in immediate jeopardy, as in two cases where patients wandered unnoticed. In one case, a vision-impaired woman left the nursing home twice within a week. In the other case, according to state health records, a patient pushed his wheelchair to the outside steps before being stopped. The same man fell, injured his head, and died the following month. Other findings by the department include not bathing a patient for a month, not investigating two injuries of unknown origin and failing to properly use an alarm system to protect patients. Apparently, the nursing home fixed the conditions, and a report based on a January 5th revisit stated that patients were no longer in immediate jeopardy. But in March, another investigation stemming from a complaint determined that the facility’s patients were again in immediate jeopardy. An April revisit survey said the immediate jeopardy problems had been fixed, but the facility still was not in substantial compliance with federal regulations. Regulators gave the facility until June 16th to reach substantial compliance.

Source: Birmingham News