No way to track abusive nurses’ aides: Mass. record could be spotless, but…
Thursday, February 24th, 2005.
A recent study by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services brought to light six nurses aides with clean records in Massachusetts’ registry but with substantiated abuse charges in other states. Another 15 had out-of-state abuse charges pending. Currently, background checks on nurses aides in Massachusettes are not done nationally; plans to do so have been hindered by funding and complexity concerns. Massachusetts’ director of health care quality, Paul Dreyer, questioned whether the severity of the problem dicated national checks. Elderly advocates, however, strongly support a national registry, citing one abuse violation as one too many.
From the article
Nationwide, a total of 1,552 aides were certified in one state although another state had found they abused a patient, the audit found. Of those, 122 aides had substantiated abuse findings in two states and one person had an abuse record in five states.
Investigators found such problems in all but one of the other 50 states and are calling for a national registry to prevent abusive workers from moving from state to state.
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