The Laurels of Chagrin Falls
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Ohio Department of Health, inspect all the nursing homes in Ohio on a regular basis to determine if they are providing the quality of care that Medicare and Medicaid require in order to protect and improve residents' health and safety. When nursing homes do not meet CMS' healthcare or fire and safety standards, these instances are cited as deficiencies and CMS requires the problems to be corrected.
A minority of nursing homes throughout the country have more problems than other nursing homes, more serious problems than other nursing homes, and a pattern of serious problems that are persistent over a long period of time. As a result, CMS maintains a list of what they call Special Focus Facilities. These are nursing homes that have a history of serious quality issues and are included in a special program to stimulate improvements in their quality of care.
Is The Laurels of Chagrin Falls a Special Focus Facility?
Table D of the Special Focus Facility list, is a list of nursing homes that qualify to be selected as a Special Focus Facility. One of the nursing homes listed in Table D is The Laurels of Chagrin Falls. The Laurels of Chagrin Falls is a facility located at 150 Cleveland Street in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. Currently, The Laurels of Chagrin Falls has a 2 out of 5-star rating overall. It has a 1-star rating for health inspections. The Laurels of Chagrin Falls has 82 beds. It is part of the Ciena Healthcare/Laurel Healthcare chain of nursing homes.
In the last 3 years, The Laurels of Chagrin Falls has been fined on four (4) separate occasions. On February 17, 2023, it was fined $33,547.00. On December 12, 2022, it was fined $53,489.00. On March 28, 2022, it was fined $38,896.00. And on November 19, 2021, it was fined $92,761.00.
How Does a Facility End Up As a Special Focus Facility?
The Ohio Department of Health and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services survey nursing homes on a regular basis. All nursing homes are surveyed on a roughly annual basis. Typically, this works out to one survey about every 18 months. Also, nursing homes are surveyed based on complaints. If you go to our home page, you will see that there's a large, red button for making complaints about nursing homes. If you have a complaint about a nursing home in Ohio, push this large, red button, and it will take you to the Ohio Department of Health website. From that website, there are multiple ways that you can make a complaint about a nursing home. You can call and make a complaint. You can make a complaint by email. There are multiple ways that you can complain about the care provided in a nursing home. These complaints result in a survey of the nursing home, known as a complaint survey.
Issues Identified During the Survey of The Laurels of Chagrin Falls
The Laurels of Chagrin Falls was surveyed on December 12, 2022. Based on interviews with residents and staff and review of records, it was determined that The Laurels of Chagrin Falls failed to ensure that at least one resident's care plan addressed the resident's chronic pain. It was determined that the nursing home failed to ensure that two other residents had care plans that accurately reflected their needs.
Any time a nursing home resident is admitted to a nursing home, the nursing home is legally obligated to perform a comprehensive assessment of that resident. Based on that comprehensive assessment, the nursing home is legally obligated to create a comprehensive care plan. That comprehensive care plan must address all of the resident's needs. The comprehensive care plan is what directs the care that the nursing home resident receives while at the nursing home.
The December 12, 2022 survey also revealed that at least one resident's care plan did not include proper instructions to meet their nutritional needs. This resident had severe cognitive impairment and required supervision while eating.
The survey also indicated that the facility failed to ensure that residents received scheduled and appropriate activities on the weekends. This affected all 34 residents in the facility. The survey also revealed that the facility failed to ensure that at least one resident received his necessary antibiotics.
Recent Incidents at The Laurels of Chagrin Falls
Actual harm occurred on December 8, 2022 when one of the residents who was cognitively impaired and required staff assistance for activities of daily living was admitted to the hospital with a diagnosis of sepsis, which is a blood infection, related to a wound on his left heel. Physician's orders for the antibiotic, doxycycline, and X-rays to rule out osteomyelitis were not completed as ordered, contributing to the hospitalization. Review of the records indicated deficient wound care for at least one resident. Based on observation, record review and interviews, the surveyors determined that the facility failed to maintain a medication error rate of less than 5 percent. The medication error rate at The Laurels of Chagrin Falls was 10.71 percent.
The surveyors also determined that the facility failed to procure food from sources of food that are considered satisfactory, and they also failed to store, prepare, distribute and serve food in accordance with professional standards. The nursing home failed to maintain a clean, sanitary kitchen area, failed to ensure that foods were stored in a clean and sanitary manner to prevent contamination and food-borne illnesses, and failed to ensure that expired products were discarded. This affected all of the residents of the nursing home.
The survey also revealed that at least one resident had thick, unkempt whiskers and oily hair. An interview with the resident indicated that he wanted to be showered and shaved, but when he asked the staff, they told him that they would get to him when they could. That resident told the surveyors that he had not showered in a long time. One of the STNAs confirmed that that resident had thick, unkempt whiskers and oily hair. That STNA revealed that she was unsure when the resident was even supposed to have a shower. An interview on June 15, 2023 with the administrator of the nursing home revealed that there were also clusters of complaints of residents not receiving showers.
Contact a Skilled and Compassionate Ohio Nursing Home Abuse and Neglect Attorney
If someone you love has been neglected or abused in a nursing home, please call us at 1-800-OHIO-LAW or contact us online, as it will be our pleasure to help you in any way that we can. If someone you love is a resident of The Laurels of Chagrin Falls, please call us as we would be happy to talk with you. If someone you love is in a nursing home, if you're not confident that they're receiving appropriate care, the Medicare.gov web site can be a great source of information. If you do need to move your loved one to another nursing home, we strongly recommend finding the new nursing home for your loved one, and then working with the personnel at the new nursing home to move your loved one. The people at the nursing home where your loved one is currently a resident will likely not be particularly helpful in helping you move your loved one given the fact that they do not want to lose the revenue. However, the people at the new nursing home, where you're planning to move your loved one, will likely be very motivated to help you move your loved one.