Jacksonville Injury Attorney Blog
The State of Florida’s Agency for Healthcare Administration maintains a “watch list” of nursing homes that have either financial or care related concerns. To be placed on the list, a nursing home must have either
filied for bankruptcy protection or that failed to meet minimum standards at the time of an inspection. The list is updated quarterly. Approximately 140 of Florida’s 600 nursing homes are currently on the watch list.
Jacksonville Nursing Homes on the Watch List
In Jacksonville, there are six nursing homes that have been put on the nursing home watch list. The nursing homes that have been added to the watch list are:
– Consulate Health Care of Jacksonville;
– Cypress Village;
– Palm Garden of Jacksonville;
– San Jose Health and Rehabilitation Center;
– Summer Brook Health Care Center; and
– West Jacksonville Health and Rehabilitation Center.
Orange Park Nursing Home on the List:
– Consulate Health Care of Orange Park
St. Augustine Nursing Home on the List:
– St. Augustine Health and Rehabilitation Center
To access the watch list click here.
The items that typically cause a nursing home to be placed on the watch list usually result from one of AHCA’s facility inspections. However, events that have taken place during outside the extremely limited time period of an inspection do not show up on an inspection report.
Because of this, the watch list can be misleading. Many nursing homes that are not on the watch list have been sued for providing substandard care. As a result, the watch list can only be used as one tool in a family’s process of determining which nursing home is appropriate.
Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration maintains a Nursing Home Guide that provides a rating system based on its inspections ranging from one to five stars on various categories including: Pressure Ulcers; Quality of Care; Nutrition and Hydration; Dignity; Quality of Life; Administration; and Restraints and Abuse.
In addition to considering these documents, we recommend that you visit several nursing homes before a decision is made. During the visit, ask to speak with the Director of Nursing and the Assitant Director of Nursing. Make sure that the nursing home is able to accept the special needs of your family member. For example, some nursing homes do not accept patients who breath via a tracheostomy tube.
While there, ask to see the common areas of the nursing home. Observe the overall cleanliness of the facility and the appearance of the residents.
Finally, once your loved one is admitted, visit regularly and be a care advocate. If you notice something that is not being addressed, bring it to the attention of staff. If it is not corrected promptly, send the administrator a certified letter explaining the situation. Certified letters are almost never ignored because the nursing home administration knows that it is dealing with someone who is not easily appeased and someone that will hold the nursing home accountable for negligence care resulting in injuries.
If you are in the process of placing a family member in a Jacksonville nursing home, feel free to contact our office. We would be more than glad to provide you with the names of nursing homes that we have found to be substandard and we will also provide the names of nursing homes that do a better job.