Some families of nursing home residents oppose the state's orders banning visitors from long-term care facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. | stock photo
Some families of nursing home residents oppose the state's orders banning visitors from long-term care facilities during the COVID-19 pandemic. | stock photo
Michigan’s COVID-19 policies regarding nursing homes have come under scrutiny for allegations of neglect of residents largely shut off from the outside world, preventing families from looking out for their best interests, according to Michigan Capitol Confidential.
The son of William Hall, Jr., of Southeast Michigan, has filed a complaint with the state nursing home regulators in the death of his father, an 82-year-old who died of sepsis. William Hall III, of Romulus, said his father had gone into a rapid decline during the spring and into the summer. Visitation was limited to phone calls or viewing through a window. These restrictions prevented the family from noticing tennis ball-sized bedsores on their father.
Hall was told that Medilodge Milford, the care home where his father lived, will be cited for violation of health care standards. A spokesman for the Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs confirmed the facility is under investigation but declined to comment when asked by Michigan Capitol Confidential.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer
| Michigan.gov
For the Hall family, it is too late to bring back a loved one.
“The last time I got to hug him was in February,” Hall III said, according to Michigan Capitol Confidential. “Until I got to hug him when he was in the hospital unconscious. I should have been able to hug him every week.”
For the state, it’s an example of the shortfalls of a policy that is intended to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, but instead can leave elderly patients exposed to other physical and mental-health issues. Hall recalled that after Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s order went into effect, he was denied access to his father for three weeks. After that period, communication was only allowed through a window.
National health experts have warned the public about health issues related to isolation, and state officials agree. However, this has not prevented the state from enacting some of the most restrictive rules in the country. Those rules were relaxed in October but have been reinstituted with the current COVID-19 surge, Michigan Capitol Confidential reported.
Hall holds Whitmer and the state responsible for putting rules into place that have had the unintended consequence of harming the very people they were intended to protect.
“Whitmer thinks she can do anything she wants without any kind of accountability,” Hall told Michigan Capital Confidential.
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