Though most states require nursing homes to conduct criminal background checks for prospective hires, 92 percent employ at least one worker with a criminal conviction, according to a report released today [1] by the inspector general for the Department of Health and Human Services.
About 5 percent of nursing home workers—or one out of every 20—had at least one conviction, according to the report, which took a random sample of 260 nursing homes certified by Medicare and ran FBI background checks on their workers.
State rules differ regarding background checks: 43 states require nursing homes to perform background checks against state records, ten of those require an additional FBI background check, and eight states don’t require background checks at all.
The rules also differ on what types of crimes disqualify workers. The report noted that of the workers with convictions, 44 percent had committed property crimes such as theft, vandalism or writing bad checks. Some 16 percent had drug-related crimes, and 13 percent had committed crimes against people, including sexual offenses.
Federal regulations prohibit nursing homes from employing workers convicted of “abusing, neglecting, or mistreating residents,” but because FBI data do not show whether the victims of the crimes were nursing home residents, it’s unclear whether these rules were violated.
The New York Times noted [2] that the current system for background checks—which Wisconsin Democrat Sen. Herb Kohl criticized as “haphazard, inconsistent, and full of gaping holes [3]—has allowed people convicted of crimes in one state simply find jobs at nursing homes in another state.
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3 comments:
Number of members of Congress who escaped tickets and/or arrest from a variety of driving offenses ranging from speeding to DUI in 1999 due to Congressional immunity: 217
Number of members of Congress who were released after being pulled over for drunken driving in 1998 by claiming Congressional immunity: 84
This is just a small sample. There are too many CONVICTED CONGRESSMEN to count.
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_many_US_senators_and_congressmen_are_convicted_felons
REP. DAN ROSTENKOWSKI (D-IL): Illegally converted official funds to his personal use and mail fraud; accused in 1996 of embezzling $700,000 from the federal government, he was charged with 13 of the original 17 counts against him. Went to prison after serving in Congress; now back in Washington working as a lobbyist.
There's a good one lol
No surprise with all the frequent thefts of patients' personal items in all the local nursing homes.
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