Specialized Information for:

Nursing HomesAssisted Living/Board & Care Home and Community Based Services
Back to News Listing

Texas State Ombudsman, Patty Ducayet, Quoted in NY Times Article about Nursing Home Discharges

February 23, 2018

Discharges and evictions have been the top-ranking category of grievances brought to State Long-Term Care Ombudsman Programs. While nursing homes can discharge residents for a limited set of reasons, legal advocates say that home operators sometimes interpret those reasons in unjustified ways. In 2015 there were 9,192 complaints about the discharge and eviction of nursing home residents, out of a total of 140,145 complaints. Patty Ducayet, the State Long-Term Care Ombudsman in Texas, said that disputes over whether a particular nursing home can meet a patient’s needs were common. That, she said, is often “a gray area.” A nursing home may be justified in saying it cannot care for patients who cannot breathe on their own. However, Ducayet said, it would not be justified in discharging patients because they refused to take medications or because they filed complaints with state officials.

Read the full article here.