Physical aggression among nursing home residents is cause for concern

About 88,000 (6.8 percent) of U.S. nursing home residents are physically aggressive every week – hitting, shoving, scratching or sexually abusing others, according to a recent study by the Archives of Internal Medicine, Medicalnewstoday.com reported. This aggression can inflict physical and psychological harm on staff and other residents. Verbal aggression, when residents threaten, scream or curse at others, also can cause difficulties.

"Physical or verbal aggression among nursing home residents with cognitive impairment may be a major cause of distress among staff and other residents injured by the aggressor, as well as to the aggressor," the study concludes. "We found that aggressive behavior among residents was associated with depression, delusions and hallucinations, and that physical aggression was also associated with constipation.

All of these factors may be amenable to intervention and, in addition to reducing the morbidity associated with these entities themselves, effective treatment may reduce the risk of violence in nursing homes."

Nursing home evacuation fails during hurricanes

Nursing homes in hurricane states had rampant deficiencies in their evacuation procedures, which harmed patients during Hurricane Katrina and other recent storms, according to a Department of Health and Human Services report released last week, The New York Times reported.

The problems that occurred included unavailable buses that required patients to be transported in borrowed vehicles that lacked air conditioning or broke down along the way. Food and water had to be rationed and medications, oxygen canisters and incontinence supplies were left behind. Staffing was inadequate and residents suffered pressure soars and urinary tract infections from the travel conditions.

Some nursing homes had no instructions on how much food and water to take, no method for assigning staff to the trips, no procedures for transporting medications and no plans for how and when to return. They could not get help from local officials because there were no formal partnerships.

The study recommends that 25 “core elements” of emergency preparedness be included in plans for the nation’s 16,125 nursing homes that receive Medicare or Medicaid money. But the government also plays a role, with advocates saying the federal government must be more explicit about the components of an acceptable plan, not just mandate one.