Elder Medical Neglect Happens More Than Anyone Would Like to Acknowledge

I was recently reading an article by Rose Hunt entitled Elder Medical Neglect Happens in Hospital and it made me sad to think how ours elders whom we were taught to respect are being treated in their golden years. There is nothing golden about a bed sore or skin tear. This is an all to common problem when the elderly are left to rely on caregivers to meet their daily needs. Don't think just because they are in a hospital or nursing home they are receiving the proper care they require. I have seen numerous patients come out of a hospital in worse shape then when they went in. The elderly patients come out with bedsores that could kill them if they are not treated right. Most of the time family members do not have the appropriate training to care for such a wound.

The sad truth is these bed sores could have been prevented by simply turning the patient on a regular basis. In hospitals this often gets overlooked because the nurses and nursing aides are to busy. Some times they will mark on the chart that the person was turned even if they were not due to lack of time or the patient sleeping. So if this happens a few times a week that patient is going to be the one to suffer with sores. I was the caregiver for an elderly lady who had a stroke and while in the hospital she fell three times due to a lack of supervision. She also developed a 5-inch bedsore. They workers in the hospital didn't want to bother turning her because they were afraid they would wake her up and have to talk to her or sit with her. Elder abuse doesn't just happen in medical facilities; several times I have seen abuse in the home. Some times the abuse is not intentional.

Family members will try to care for their loved ones and not realize how the person needs to be cared for. They might not realize that an elderly persons skin becomes very thin and brittle and can rip with the littlest of force. While they may think they are doing the right thing by taking care of the elderly loved one they really are causing more harm. Abuse can happen when home health care agencies send out workers that don't have enough training to be able to provide the proper care. I have seen workers sent to the home that have never provided personal care before. All they have done is cleaned or cooked for elderly people. One case was to care for a gentleman that had to have all his daily activities provided for him. He had a feeding tube and a catheter .He also required the use of a Hoyer lift. This can be very dangerous if the person using the lift doesn't know what they are doing. I have seen patients be dropped out of the lift due to a lack of knowledge for the person providing the care. Some times the abuse is caused by stress, the workers gets frustrated if the patient doesn't want to cooperate. They might grab a little harder then usual when helping to lift the patient or transferring them. This could lead to bruises and skin tears.

I once worked in a private home caring for an elderly lady where her son was so concerned with his mother money he hired workers and told them all they needed to do was keep his mother company. This was very untrue his mother required complete care. One of the workers would leave her in a soiled diaper all night and tell her she could wait a little bit when the elderly woman asked to be cleaned. I would go in for the day shift and she would be wet all the way through her bed. I reported this to the woman's daughter on many occasions. This is so dangerous it can lead to urinary and kidney infections. Not to mention skin irritations and bed sores. Some day these people that abuse our elders will be an elder themselves and they might require care. I wonder if they will receive the proper care or will they be treated like they have treated others. If you suspect an elderly person is not being cared for properly please speak up and alert someone. Sometimes the elderly patients are unable to speak for themselves