Nurse charged with injuring infants at Madison hospital

MADISON – Prosecutors charged a former nurse Thursday with abusing multiple infants in a Madison hospital’s intensive care unit, accusing him of bruising them and breaking their bones.

Christopher Kaphaem faces 19 felony child abuse counts involving nine infants.

Kaphaem’s attorney didn’t return a message Thursday.

Police began investigating reports of injuries to infants in UnityPoint Health-Meriter Hospital’s infant intensive care unit in February, according to the criminal complaint. Hospital staff had documented an array of injuries to nine infants, including bruising, broken ribs, broken legs and a fractured skull. Kaphaem, 43, inflicted the injuries between March 2017 and February of this year, according to the complaint.

Investigators focused on Kaphaem, who worked the night shift in the unit, after other nurses told them that he had cared for the babies.

Meriter suspended Kaphaem on Feb. 8, and state regulators suspended his license on March 19.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services inspected the hospital in February, days after it suspended Kaphaem and issued a scathing report saying the facility didn’t do enough to prevent the injuries.

The failure was so serious it constituted an immediate threat to patient health safety and the hospital’s Medicare contract could be terminated if the problem isn’t fixed, the report said. The hospital released a statement saying the facility remains “devastated by what happened.”

The statement offers a bulleted list of improvements, including immediately removing Kaphaem from his job, cooperating with authorities, installing around-the-clock surveillance cameras in infant intensive care unit rooms and setting up a hotline for anyone with concerns about care in the unit.