Buffalo, NY (WBEN) New York Attorney General Letitia James today announced a settlement with Kaleida Health, the largest not-for-profit health care provider in Western New York, to resolve an investigation into the death of a 16-month-old pediatric resident in 2015, as well as the previous arrests of 17 caregivers in 2014, who were subsequently convicted of neglect of a resident with Huntington’s disease at the HighPointe on Michigan Health Care Facility in Buffalo.
“Keeping New Yorkers safe is one of my top priorities,” said Attorney General James. “Kaleida Health put residents of HighPointe at risk, which is why we fought for corrective actions and restitution. My office will closely monitor compliance with the agreement to ensure the future safety of residents.”
Kaleida agreed to pay $500,000 in restitution and damages as well as to increase staffing and supervision in the facility, and to continue the implementation of policy changes to improve its operation of HighPointe. Following the infant’s death and in response to the investigation, Kaleida cooperated with the Office of the Attorney General's investigation and expended more than $8 million for the hiring of increased direct care and supervisory staff, a physician, and improvements to systems and equipment and to policies and procedures.
The agreement sets forth the Attorney General’s findings that Kaleida provided insufficient supervision and oversight of the management and staff at HighPointe, a 300-bed facility located in downtown Buffalo, and the determination that the death of the 16-month-old pediatric resident was the result of the resident being left unattended while inappropriately being tube-fed in a high chair that was not required by the infant’s care plan. During that time, the infant suffocated. The investigation revealed that at the time of death, the infant could not hold his head up without artificial support and did not have the ability to clear his throat or call for help. Despite prior documented episodes of airway obstruction and vomiting while feeding, the resident’s care plan had not been adjusted to require nursing staff to be present and observe the resident during gastric tube feeding. Instead, the facility relied upon a pager/alarm system to remotely monitor his vital signs. However, at the time of the infant’s death, the system had not been properly adjusted by staff, there were no policies or procedures in place to correctly operate and rely on the monitoring system, and the nursing staff was not properly trained to use the system.
The Attorney General’s investigation also concluded that HighPointe management failed to properly investigate the resident’s death and failed to report the death in a timely manner to the New York State Department of Health, as required by law.
Attorney General James reminds New Yorkers that the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit (MFCU) in the Office of the Attorney General has a toll-free hotline and online portal for reporting suspected abuse and neglect of nursing home residents or fraud by Medicaid providers. While complaints can be made anonymously, it assists MFCU investigations when the Office receives specific allegations involving residents' names; dates and types of alleged abuse and/or neglect; names of facility employees involved or having notice of the situation; and whether the facility had observed or its owners and/or management had been notified of allegations of abuse, neglect, or lack of sufficient staffing and/or Registered Nurse or Administrator supervision of staff.
Kaleida issued the following statement:
“We have been cooperating with the Attorney General’s Office on this matter. The settlement involves cases that occurred upwards of five years ago. As we have said numerous times in the past, these issues are unacceptable and are not tolerated. Safe and reliable care is at the core of all that we do. Our first and foremost concern is the residents that we serve.
“As one of the Attorney General’s conditions to this settlement, Kaleida Health neither admits nor denies the Attorney General’s findings.
“It is important to note – and the Attorney General’s office points out - that we have made significant changes and investments over the past few years relative to staffing and quality of care. This includes adding more than 75 full-time employees, changing out 85% of management and 60% of our front line staff. Most importantly, we are now rated five stars for our quality. So, despite an extremely challenging environment, we continue to make progress.”
Since 2014, Kaleida Health has invested more than $12 million into HighPointe on Michigan on these various quality and staffing initiatives.
Today, the facility is rated four stars overall and five stars (5 out of 5) for quality by Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS).
CMS recently released its “Value Based Rankings” for all skilled nursing facilities in United State and HighPointe on Michigan was rated in the top tier (tying for first) out of 15,200 nursing homes.