Our parents spend a good portion of their lives taking care of us, so when they reach the age where they can no longer take care of themselves, we want to return the favor. Unfortunately, despite our best intentions, sometimes we are unable to take on the enormous responsibility of caring for the elderly. With all of the horror stories of elder abuse and neglect, many people think they can do a better job caring for their loved one than strangers could, but sometimes it becomes too much and they need to realize that they need help before it is too late.
Unsanitary Living Conditions and Bedsores Lead to Woman’s Death
Carmella Saldana, of Oklahoma City, was arrested on June 6, 2011 on a felony abuse and neglect by a caretaker charge. Saldana’s mother, Deborah Gay Ramirez, suffered a stroke in 2006 that left the right side of her body paralyzed. In 2009 she suffered a mini-stroke that left her completely paralyzed and bedridden. According to Saldana’s sister Christa Ramirez, Saldana took a more active role in their mother’s care after her stroke. But after their mother died on August 7, 2010 at the age of 57, Christa is accusing her sister of elder abuse and wants her to pay for the way she treated their mother.
The house where Saldana lived with Deborah Ramirez was gravely unsanitary, having been infested with animal feces and roaches. Ramirez died of health complications and while no autopsy was performed, Christa believes that the bedsores that her mother developed while living with Saldana added to her failing health. A couple months before she died, a doctor found five bone-depth bedsores on her body. After finding the bedsores, a health care worker reported the elder abuse and living conditions in Saldana’s home to Adult Protective Services. According to court documents, hospice employees had set up appointments in the past to teach Saldana the proper way to care for her mother, but on one occasion Saldana refused to let them in the home. Investigators also found old, dried food in her feeding tube. On another occasion, an 18-year-old girl drinking wine coolers was found caring for Ramirez. According to Christa, Deborah developed an infection and was placed on a breathing machine while in the hospital, “She wasn’t clean and her wounds were infected,” Christa Ramirez said. “My mother was suffering.”
Many adult children have the best intentions when they decide to become the caregiver for their elderly loved ones, but some become overwhelmed and begin to abuse or neglect them. Caring for a disabled or elderly person all by yourself can be an incredible amount of work. This is something that you need to become aware of before making this commitment.
Elder Abuse Lawyers in New Jersey and Philadelphia
If your loved one is currently under the care of an individual or they are a resident of a nursing home or care facility and you are worried that the care they are receiving is negligent, abusive, or inadequate, contact the Mininno Law Office for a free case evaluation. You may also call for a free consultation at (856) 833-0600 in New Jersey, or (215) 567-2380 in Philadelphia.
Prentiss Center for Skilled Nursing Care, a MetroHealth nursing home in Cleveland, has been in the news recently because Steve Piskor captured the abuse of his 78 year old mother, Esther, on a hidden camera. The videos, which have led to both criminal charges and regulatory investigations, show nurse’s aides Virgen Caraballo and Giselle Nelson striking the patient’s face, violently throwing her into her bed and wheelchair, pushing her face into the wall, and repeatedly spraying her face with an unknown liquid that was later identified as perfume.
A woman entered the Lake Ridge Care Center in Buffalo, Minnesota on January 14, 2010 with a diagnosis of congestive heart failure and low potassium. She was prescribed two tablets of potassium three times a day to help keep her blood pumping through her heart. On January 23, 2010, the resident was sent to the emergency room because she was found unresponsive. Treaters in the emergency found a severely abnormal heart rhythm and extremely low potassium levels. The woman died later that afternoon. Her official cause of death was cardiac arrest. 
According to a report issued by the Minnesota Department of Health Facility Complaints Office, the man fell from his wheelchair on March 8th and suffered a “large hematoma, approximately four centimeters by three centimeters, on his left forehead.” He had bleeding that was putting pressure on his brain and depriving him of oxygen. The patient was examined 30 minutes after the fall, but no vital signs or neurological tests were done for at least three hours. Four hours after the fall, he was unresponsive and his vital signs were not stable. The nursing home transferred him to a hospital where he died two days later on March 10th. The death certificate states the cause of death as a “massive intracranial hemorrhage.”
An 82-year-old man from Illinois died this month at Heartland Healthcare nursing home. According to the police report, Irvin W. Brackett was found by nursing assistant Annette Payton at 10:30 p.m. on the floor with an oxygen tube and electrical cord wrapped around his neck and tied to an assistance lever that was hanging over his bed. Payton immediately called other nurses for help. They removed the constraints and began emergency resuscitation. An ambulance was called to help but nothing could be done and the nursing home called for the coroner at 12:16 a.m. Brackett was pronounced dead at the scene by the Knox County Coroner Mark Thomas. According to Thomas: 
On April 17, Grove called an ambulance to her home because she believed she was overdosing on drugs. While in the home, police found the elderly couple injured and in unsanitary conditions. The 77 year old husband was found in his urine soaked bed with blood and feces smeared on the bed and bed frame. Both victims were taken to the hospital. the husband was taken for facial bruises, broken ribs, and a partially collapsed lung, and his 82 year old wife was taken for a hand and wrist injury which she said she received when Grove pushed her wheelchair across the room and pinned her hand against the wall. The wife also told the police she heard Grove beating her husband on several occasions. The couple is bedridden/confined to wheelchairs, the husband has had part of his leg amputated, and the wife recently had hip surgery. The husband was in the hospital several weeks prior to this when he had to have one of his eyes surgically removed after a TV set fell on him, which his wife believes was an injury from Grove.
Sherrye Dianne Huff, the former administrator of the home, was arrested in May on five felony charges- three counts of theft and two counts of exploiting an elderly or disabled person- and one misdemeanor charge of theft for stealing from an Alzheimer’s patient. Donna Tower, the elderly man’s niece, said that the man would tell his family that someone was stealing from him but everyone brushed it off because of his Alzheimer’s. They later found out that he was telling the truth and Huff was taking his checks.
– Physical Abuse is the non-accidental use of physical force that may result in injury, physical pain or impairment of an elderly person. Physical abuse includes acts of violence such as hitting, beating, shaking, shoving, kicking and burning as well as inappropriate use of medications, physical restraints, depriving basic needs and force-feeding.