Amputations, sexual assault, lice: Bay Area nursing home operator settles with counties, state
A company operating 10 nursing homes in and around the Bay Area has settled a lawsuit by local county prosecutors and the State of California alleging it neglected vulnerable patients’ medical care and hygiene needs and exposed them to physical and sexual assaults.
Under the settlement, Mariner Health Care, with two facilities in San Jose, two in San Pablo, two in Hayward, one in Oakland, one in Fremont, one in San Rafael and one in Santa Cruz, agreed to pay up to $15.5 million if it fails to abide by terms related to patient safety and staffing levels.
Mariner could not be reached for comment on the settlement. According to a press release from the office of Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price, the company neither admitted nor denied wrongdoing.
“Understaffing left residents vulnerable and the inadequate care resulted in unnecessary amputations, the spread of diseases such as lice and pests among residents, and a high number of unreported sexual assault cases, among other issues,” a press release by California Attorney General Rob Bonta said.
In 2021, California’s Division of Medi-Cal Fraud and Elder Abuse, and the district attorneys of Alameda, Marin, Santa Cruz, and Los Angeles counties sued all of Mariner’s 19 skilled nursing facilities in California and the company’s corporate management. Mariner allegedly “understaffed facilities leading to resident harm,” and “unsafely discharged residents from the facilities,” Bonta’s office said of the lawsuit in Alameda County Superior Court.
Mariner also submitted false staffing numbers to the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to inflate their rating on the agency’s Five-Star Quality Rating System for nursing homes, according to Bonta’s office.
According to Price’s office, issues at Mariner facilities also included infected bedsores, falls and disease.
In October 2021, a jury awarded nearly $10 million in punitive damages to five residents and five family members of patients who died at Mariner’s since-shuttered Parkview Healthcare Center nursing home in Hayward. The lawsuit claimed the problems were rooted in staff shortages. The jury found the facility and Mariner responsible for deaths and abuse of patients. At least 111 residents caught COVID-19 at the height of the pandemic, and 18 died.
The settlement with the state and county district attorneys, filed last week, requires Mariner to discharge patients in accordance with state and federal laws requiring discharge plans and timely written notification of impending discharges, along with reporting abuse and neglect and providing adequate staffing. The company must also abstain from providing “false, inflated or misleading information” to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.