‘We had to protect my grandmother’
Fariza Trinos thought her grandma was being cared for in a Mississauga nursing home – until she saw her bedsores
The infected bedsore on her grandmother’s buttock made Fariza Trinos cringe.
She grabbed her iPhone and shot pictures of the pressure ulcer, a foul wound eating into the skin of her 88-year-old grandmother at Erin Mills Lodge, a nursing home in Mississauga.
The shock of seeing that sore jolted Trinos into action.
With her mother, Zohreh Mehdizadeh, she asked nursing staff hard questions. When problems per- sisted, the mother and daughter created a file folder of evidence, shooting photos and videos of the home’s care.
“We had to protect my grandmother,” said Trinos, a 30-year-old sales co-ordinator for a Bay Street bank. “I can’t imagine what happens to people without family to advocate for them.”
A Star investigation has found that the failure of nursing homes to deal with pressure ulcers results in catastrophic injuries to elderly residents. Many die, painfully, from these grotesque, infected sores, leaving families devastated.
Last year, inspectors from the Ontario Ministry of Health issued 229 violations in 213 homes — up from 88 in 77 homes the year before. That spike is likely due to a boost in the ministry’s tough new annual inspections — there 589 carried out in 2014, compared to 45 the year before.
“We are committed to the health and well-being of Ontarians living in long-term care homes and firmly believe in public accountability and transparency,” said ministry spokesman David Jensen.
Today, the Star profiles the story of former nursing home residents Fatemeh Hajimoradi, who has a serious pressure ulcer on her buttock, and Dorothy Benson, who died from problems related to gaping bedsores on her leg and foot.
Hajimoradi is now in Credit Valley Hospital, thanks to her family’s advocacy. But the complaint filed by her granddaughter, Trinos, with the ministry got no results.
Trinos emailed those photographs, with a complaint, to the ministry last spring. The ministry inspector didn’t visit the home until Aug. 25 — two months after Hajimoradi was permanently moved to the hospital.
Without interviewing the family, the investigator discounted the complaint and told Trinos the photos were not accepted because they could be edited or photo-shopped.
“I feel like I’m helpless now,” Trinos said, after ending her call with the ministry. “They aren’t going to send anyone else in there. They just go in, close the book and that’s it.”
Jensen, the ministry spokesman, said inspectors do accept photos and must interview families in their investigation. Asked why that didn’t happen in this case, he said the inspector used notes and photos from Trinos’ original complaint with an intake worker.
Now Trinos and her mother, Mehdizadeh, want their story made public as a warning to other families: watch closely, speak up and remember that a bedsore isn’t a benign skin condition — it’s a toxic threat that requires the most vigilant care.
In January 2013, Mehdizadeh entrusted her mother, Hajimoradi, to the Erin Mills Lodge. Hajimoradi has Parkinson’s disease and dementia. She isn’t able to move on her own and — like a growing number of longterm care residents — requires help with regular repositioning so that pressure from sitting or lying in the same spot does not create bedsores.
Mehdizadeh said she understood skin breakdown was a risk but expected the staff to provide intensive care — including proper nutrition and hydration — so as to prevent the agony of serious infections and open wounds.
“My mother is suffering, suffering. We are all suffering,” Mehdizadeh said. “I’m speaking out about this for all people in the older generation. Nursing homes are supposed to give them a safe journey home. But where are their rights to proper care?”
Two years later, in May 2015, Trinos’ notes said a worker at Erin Mills Lodge privately told the family about a serious and smelly bedsore on Hajimoradi’s bottom.
Trinos and her mother said they didn’t recognize the significance of the sore, nor did they see it, because the dressings that covered it were changed before their visits. “Come at a different time than you usually do, come and surprise (staff ),” they recalled the worker telling them.
The next day, Trinos’ mother, Mehdizadeh, visited in the morning instead of the late afternoon. She told the nurse to open the dressing on her mother’s bottom. The pressure ulcer was partially black and smelled like rotting flesh. Horrified, she took the first of many pictures.
Several days later, her mother wasn’t eating and was shaking with fever and nausea. Mehdizadeh demanded that the home call 911 and took her mother to hospital.
Mehdizadeh said her mother was admitted to hospital with two infections: sepsis, from the bedsore, and a urinary tract infection. In the hospi- tal, Mehdizadeh and Trinos watched as nurses treated the pressure wound with sanitary cleaning kits. They were impressed.
When Hajimoradi returned to the nursing home 10 days later, Trinos took photos and notes to document the difference in wound care. She said staff didn’t follow the specific instructions sent by the hospital and didn’t have the same cleaning kits.
She said staff didn’t offer pain medication before using undiluted iodine on the open wound “while my grandma was crying and screaming.” Unlike the careful cleaning process used in the hospital, where nurses changed their gloves twice, Trinos photographed a worker cleaning the infected sore with one gloved and one bare hand.
On June 21, Trinos and her mother noticed that the dressing for a pressure wound on her hand was missing and the air mattress to help with the bedsore on her grandmother’s buttocks was deflated.
Eventually, Trinos called 911 and Hajimoradi was returned to Credit Valley Hospital, where she remains. This time, she was admitted with a dark red early-stage ulcer on her tailbone and a deeper ulcer on her buttock.
Erin Mills Lodge was sold by Sifton Properties to Schlegel Villages on July10 — after Hajimoradi left. Schlegel spokeswoman Rose Lamb said the former operators tried to work with Hajimoradi’s family but said the family insisted on taking her to the hospital. Lamb also said a subsequent meeting between Erin Mills workers and hospital staff concluded there had been no neglect.
Lamb said the home’s current internal monthly data shows that four out of 86 residents have “worsening” pressure ulcers.
She also cited the most recent report from the Canadian Institute for Health Information, which shows the incidence of worsening pressure ulcers at the home declined in 201314. That year, Erin Mills’ incidence rates dropped to 1.1 per cent from 3.9 per cent the prior year. The Ontario average for 2013-14 was 3.9 per cent.
Hajimoradi developed problems with ulcers in the spring of 2015, a period that is not included in the report.
“I’m speaking out about this for all people in the older generation. Nursing homes are supposed to give them a safe journey home. But where are their rights to proper care?” ZOHREH MEHDIZADEH