Beverly Enterprises - Poster Child Of Fraud And Neglect In Nursing Home Industry

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Not having enough caregivers, he says, is tragic for the residents. "Nearly everyone living in a nursing home," he notes, "is there because they require assisted living."

"Many have had strokes and have to be fed their meals," Mr Thomas said. "When there aren't enough caregivers," he continued, "some residents may not be fed until their food is cold and inedible. "

"In addition," he advised, "food is another expense for the nursing home that is sometimes cut to increase profit."

Mr Thomas says it is not unusual to see a resident lose 60 pounds or more in just a few months while they are in a bad nursing home. "Some residents are literally starving," he said.

"When moved to a better nursing home," he reports, "these people regain their lost weight."

This corporation has no doubt cut a lot of corners to pay the salaries of the company big-wigs. Chairman, CEO, and President, William Floyd's annual salary is $2.23 million, according to court filings. In addition, Mr Floyd is the individual owning the most shares of company stock with approximately 803,972 shares at a market value of about $9,326,075.20.

David Devereaux is the Chief Operating Officer of Nursing Facilities and Executive Vice President and his annual pay is approximately $854,000 and he is the individual owning the second most shares of BEI stock with approximately 255,204 shares at a value of approximately $2,960,366.40.

Indianapolis Attorney George Gray agrees that it boils down to profits. "Most neglect and abuse that we see in our law practice," he said, "can be traced to the corporate owners and management companies understaffing their nursing homes, in other words, putting their profits over the proper care of the elderly patients who have been entrusted to them."

However, according to Mr Gray, the top dogs in a company rarely face consequences. "The corporations that run nursing homes are faceless, money-making machines," he said, "and it is hard for prosecutors to prove and trace the criminal culpability of nursing home abuse up the chain of command to the managers and owners."

According to Attorney Thomas, another understaffing concern at Beverly relates to residents who require assistance going to the toilet who become incontinent because there is not enough staff to always assist them. "Obviously," he notes, "it is humiliating to these residents to soil themselves."

One of the lawsuit complaints alleges that understaffing "in Beverly facilities causes the facilities to be dirty, constantly smell of urine and feces, serve as breeding grounds for lice and other problems caused by unsanitary conditions, and to generally deprive residents of a dignified existence."

"I have yet to find a Beverly facility that does not always smell like urine and feces," Mr. Thomas said. "The reason is that there are not enough caregivers to keep the residents clean."

He recently deposed a doctor treating patients in a Beverly facility, he said, who testified that the facility always smelled like a men's urinal at a park, and at 3:00 a.m. there would be many patients screaming. "The doctor (who was retired military) compared the nursing home to Auschwitz," Mr. Thomas said.

Pressure sores are a painful skin condition also referred to as ulcers, and bed sores and are most often caused or made worse by individuals having to lie in urine and feces for long periods of time and not being turned over often enough.

As a result of the understaffing at Beverly, the plaintiff in this case was not kept cleaned and turned enough and developed pressure sores so severe that they required hospital treatment. On one occasion, the doctor at the hospital treated the sores, applied bandages, and dated the bandages.

Despite the doctor's orders and multiple requests by the plaintiff's children, the staff did not change the bandages for over a week following the hospitalization, and the bandages had rotted into her body with the date written by the hospital doctor still visible.

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