Nursing Home Update - Friday, April 30, 2010 16:06 - 0 Comments

Lake Worth Nursing Home Accused In Racketeering Lawsuit

A Lake Worth nursing home has been accused of engaging in racketeering to defraud Medicare and Medicaid and “preying on vulnerable adults.” It’s claimed that Lake Worth Manor failed to provide adequate treatment to patients or improperly kept them until they developed other diseases that could restart government payments. The suit, filed by an 83-year-old former patient, seeks class action status and also names Millennium Management LLC and Horizon Staffing LLC as Defendants. The Plaintiff says she developed disfiguring ulcers on her heels before leaving the facility.

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Miami, refers to more than two dozen other patients by their initials and ages. Records show Lake Worth Manor, a 120-bed, for-profit nursing home, has a one-star rating from the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration, placing it in the bottom 20% of nursing homes in the region for compliance with safety and health regulations. The home also has spent 31 days on a state “watch list” since 2007, according to AHCA’s website. A Medicare site rates the home with two out of five stars.

It appears there were some “interesting persons” working in key slots for Lake Worth Manor. The facility’s co-medical director had his license to practice suspended in Pennsylvania in 2001 after he had consensual sex with a 20-year-old patient, according to records. New Jersey revoked his license in connection with the incident and he gave up his license in New York, but is fully licensed in Florida. He stepped down from his director’s role in February. The person identified in the lawsuit as head nurse during the Plaintiff’s stay was arrested in October for operating an assisted living facility in Loxahatchee without a license, according to the Florida Attorney General’s Office. The woman worked for the nursing home from August to November 2008. Marc Kurzman, who is from Minnesota, and Dara Siegel, who is from Boca Raton, Fla., were the lawyers who represented the Plaintiff in this lawsuit. They did a very good job.

Source: Palm Beach Post