Taking action against deficient nursing homes
The New Mexican article (“Feds take action against nursing home,” Sept. 4), showcases the impact on patient care that sometimes occur when a corporation, Preferred Care Partners Management Group, buys and takes over operations of a health care facility.
I believe the philosophy of Preferred Care Partners Management Group of Plano, Texas, appears to be in tandem with the philosophy of other corporations that purchase and operate acute care hospitals in New Mexico. This purchase and operation of acute care hospitals has been occurring in New Mexico for several years. We cannot allow this to continue. We need to protect the very people that these facilities were established to care for and treat.
The philosophy of “bottom line profits” of corporations that purchase such facilities seems to violate patient safety and patient care goals. These facilities also can place health care workers in the precarious position of choosing between working under these conditions and keeping their jobs, or speaking up and losing their jobs.
The “goal” of Preferred Care Partners Management Group (the same goal as corporations that buy and operate acute care hospitals in New Mexico) is to advance their bottom line and produce a profit. To accomplish this goal, I believe that these corporations reduce the “quality of patient care standards,” reduce staffing to insufficient levels in order to “save money,” receive low “grades” from such watchdog groups as The Leapfrog Group, and receive a barrage of patient complaints that they settle instead of bringing to trial, which would reveal their deficiencies to the public.
New Mexico hospitals refuse to publicize sentinel events. Sentinel events are: “As defined by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, a sentinel event is an unexpected occurrence involving death or serious physical or psychological injury, or the risk of death or serious injury.” Why? What are hospitals afraid of ? If a hospital has a low rate of sentinel events, would hospitals not want to share this with the community and show that they provide safe patient care?
The problem with catching acute care hospitals with unsafe patient staffing levels is that hospitals staff up when regulatory agencies visit for a review. Somehow, hospitals get a “notion” that a regulatory agency will be coming for a review. Hospital administrators then call in extra staff, alert managers, “clean up” all nursing units, review patient charts for compliance and “court” regulatory agencies for a “positive” report. There have been instances of hospital staff being interviewed by regulatory agency personnel while hospital administrative personnel are within “hearing distance.” This is a disservice to the regulatory process and to the public.
The Patient Safety Act of 2017, House Bill 288 and Senate Bill 281, requires New Mexico hospitals to be transparent in their staffing levels by submitting their staffing levels to the New Mexico Department of Health for publication on their website. This information provides all New Mexicans with the necessary information to make an informed decision as to where they wish to receive hospital health care and have procedures performed. Patients deserve safe, competent and appropriate care. Patients need to be provided with staffing level information in order to know that there will be adequate nursing, nursing assistant, technical staff and ancillary staff levels to provide quality patient care during their hospital stay.
The Patient Safe Staffing Act of 2017 provides many other provisions to protect patients while they are hospitalized. Please support this legislation in upcoming legislative sessions.
For those hospitals or rural hospitals that are already compliant with safe patient staffing, there is very little that they have to do in order to be compliant with this legislation. And, the nurses of New Mexico applaud these facilities for having patient safety and positive patient outcomes as their main goal.
The with problem catching acute care hospitals with unsafe patient staffing levels is that hospitals staff up when regulatory agencies visit for a review.