A nursing home was fighting allegations it didn’t have an evacuation plan in place during Hurricane Harvey.
Lake Arthur Place in Port Arthur, TX, flooded after the hurricane, and volunteers — along with a filming reporter — took a resident out of the facility and into a boat during live coverage.
But Andrew Kerr, president of the Lake Arthur operator Senior Care Center, said the facility had planned to shelter in place and had plenty of food, water and medications on hand for residents.
“Unknown volunteers forcibly removed them,” he said in a statement.
“Our team was not informed of the volunteers’ authority or proper training to do so, and our caregivers, who were trying to protect our residents in the chaos of the situation, were physically restrained during the evacuation,” Kerr wrote.
Further, he said staff tried to accompany residents, but many became separated during the evacuation process.
However, some families of residents said they planned to file a lawsuit alleging medical malpractice. A hearing on the allegations was scheduled for late September.
From the October 01, 2017 Issue of McKnight's Long-Term Care News
