Nursing Home Abuse Caught On Camera In North Troy!

On April 1, 2010, it was reported that fourteen nurses, nurses aides and a physicians’ assistant at the Northwoods Rehabilitation and Extended Care Facility near Troy, New York were charged with endangering the welfare of elderly residents and felony falsification of nursing home records.

The investigation, conducted by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, produced surveillance video collected over a six-week period showing the neglect. The surveillance video showed that the staff “routinely failed to turn and position immobile residents, often leaving residents in the same position for an entire shift” and the nursing staff failed to administer medications as well as treat residents for pressure sores. The video footage also showed that the aides failed to check residents for incontinence or change undergarments for long periods of time. Additionally, the residents’ medical records show that the nurses and aides falsified medical records to conceal their neglect. The physicians’ assistant created a phony record of an annual medical exam that never happened.

This isn’t the first time that Northwoods has been in trouble. Last summer federal officials barred Northwoods from receiving Medicaid or Medicare payments for new residents in the wake of complaints that workers routinely ignored the buzzer system used by patients in need of assistance. In January, 2010, a male nurse’s aide at Northwoods pleaded guilty to sexually abusing a 78 year old female resident in a 2008 incident.

Great work by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in exposing the neglect that is prevalent in many nursing homes throughout New York!