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Nursing homes vow to fight
By AMY HERDY © St. Petersburg Times, published October 4, 2000 TAMPA -- Armando Caballero does not want to move his 92-year-old mother. "The state says it's filthy," Caballero said of Rehabilitation and Healthcare Center of Tampa, where Julia Caballero has lived the past three years. "I've always found everything very clean. . . . I think this is politics," he said. At a news conference Monday, Gov. Jeb Bush and Agency for Health Care Administration Secretary Ruben King-Shaw announced the cancellation of Medicaid contracts with six Florida nursing homes the state says are chronic problems. It means Caballero and hundreds of others have until Nov. 1 to find another Medicaid facility for their loved ones. It also means almost certain closure for the six facilities once the Medicaid patients leave, since the financial health of those homes depends heavily on Medicaid patients. The timing, Caballero says, is suspect: Gov. Bush's brother, GOP presidential candidate George W. Bush, is trying to win over Florida, a state known for its senior population. "I don't care what Jeb Bush says," he said. "My mother is very happy here." Any insinuation of politics is "way off base," King-Shaw said. Monday's announcement capped a two-year investigation of Florida's 675 nursing homes that ended this past weekend, he said. "This was not a political move of any sort," he said. "This was a decision we reached out of the best interest for the citizens in these nursing homes." A spokesman for Bush's office could not be reached Tuesday. The Medicaid funding cut affects the Tampa nursing home, the Abbey Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in St. Petersburg, Crystal Springs Nursing and Rehabilitation in Thonotosassa, Colonial Oaks Rehabilitation in Fort Myers, the Magnolias in Pensacola, and Greenwood Rehabilitation in West Palm Beach. Tuesday afternoon, a half-dozen officials with Vencor Inc., the Kentucky-based company that owns the Tampa and St. Petersburg homes, swept through the 174-bed Tampa facility at 4411 N Habana Ave. for a brief visit with patients, their families and staff. Medicaid paid for 70 percent of the residents last year. "I came down here to provide support for the people in this building," said Don Finney, president of the health services division of Vencor, as he shook hands with Caballero and others like him on the facility's second floor. "We don't think the action taken by the state was justified, and we're going to pursue all appropriate means to rectify the situation." The interior of the Tampa facility, a nondescript brown building with weed-riddled landscaping,resembled a hospital, with freshly mopped floors and sparse rooms containing two adjustable beds, dressers and end tables. Residents in wheelchairs lined the hallways in the morning, waiting to be taken to lunch later by a relative or a nursing aide. At one end of the hall sat Julia Garcia, 60, disabled by a stroke. "I like this place," said Garcia, who added that her family does not visit. "They have good food. But I don't like some of the nurses. If they don't like you, they don't do anything for you." Garcia, her hair freshly braided and wearing hot pink lipstick, clutched a Bugs Bunny blanket spotted with brown stains. She used to have bedsores "a lot," she said, before she complained. Now, she said, the only fault she could find with the facility was that money and other valuables are sometimes stolen. Next to Garcia, Tampa resident Gloria Ferlita visited with her mother, 92-year-old Eulalia Rodriguez, and fretted about the possibility of having to move her. "She doesn't like change," Ferlita said."She's so happy here. I'm so mad at Mr. Bush." Ferlita said she and her children visit her mother every day and "check her from her head to her toes." Never have they found anything wrong, she said, such as the bedsores some patients at that facility had, according to a November 1998 report by state investigators. The report also said patients had been overly sedated because employees didn't follow medical plans, and an untended male had wandered off. Robert Gill, a spokesman for Integrated Health Systems of Maryland, which owns Crystal Springs and Rehabilitation in Thonotosassa, said the Medicaid funding cut came as a "sudden and unexpected announcement." A 1998 report cited the 180-bed facility for failing to intervene when a nursing aide repeatedly yelled and cursed at patients. Another report said a patient lost 22 percent of her body weight within five months of admission. Medicaid paid for 87 percent of the residents last year. "We plan to work with the state to determine what our options are," Gill said. "Obviously, we feel the facility should be able to continue to provide what we feel is high quality care for our patients." Gill said IHS plans to care for its patients until the differences are resolved with the state, or the patients find another place to live. Yet with the negative reports from the state, the families of these nursing home residents should be looking for another place for them to live, said Lyn Bodiford, the state legislative representative for AARP. "If it were my mother, I'd be looking to find a better place." Although moving is traumatic, Ms. Bodiford said, "this is a good thing." Relatives should consider several criteria for selecting another home, she said, particularly the number of staff members. Information about other facilities is available from the nursing home, state or federal agencies. "What we hope is that we do a better job of identifying these homes quickly and getting them out of the business" sooner, Ms. Bodiford said. -- Times staff writer Jounice Nealy contributed to this report.
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From the Times state desk
From the state wire
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