San Francisco Injury Lawyer Blog

According to a report from KGTV 10 News, San Diego, California, the Department of Health and Human Services, through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), is taking a toughened stance against instances of “social media abuse” in nursing homes. The CMS issued a nationwide memo to state health departments calling upon nursing homes and the state departments that oversee their operations to begin creating and following policies limiting the ability of nursing home workers to abuse residents through social media. The new directives come after numerous cases across the country – including one alleged, recently-reported instance in Vista – of nursing home workers taking advantage of residents under their care using social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter.

Social Media Used to Abuse Nursing Home Residents

Numerous incidents paint a picture of the “typical” instance of nursing home abuse: An elderly resident residing in a nursing home is vulnerable because he or she is suffering from some physical and/or (oftentimes) mental condition. Nursing home workers take photographs or videos of these residents in various stages of undress or in other embarrassing circumstances and then upload these photos and videos to social media platforms. This (of course) is designed to expose the nursing home resident to embarrassment and humiliation (although, because of the mental conditions many of these residents have, the residents themselves are often unaware of what the nursing home worker is doing). Family and friends of the mistreated resident are oftentimes made aware of the humiliating photo or video when they come upon it online by chance.

“Patient dumping” used to refer to the practice of a hospital or other care facility kicking a patient out of their facility if that patient’s resources dried up. At that point, the healthcare facility was not likely to obtain any further compensation for their efforts at treating the patient, and these facilities needed to make room for new patients who needed treatment – and who could pay for it.

Within the past few weeks, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) have asked healthcare providers about a new healthcare fraud scheme that also goes by the name “patient dumping.” In this particular scheme, health care providers like doctors’ offices and urgent care centers entice patients who would otherwise qualify for Medicare or Medicaid to sign up for private health insurance policies. In some alleged instances, the third party enticing the patient may even agree to pay for the patient’s insurance premium in order to secure the patient’s participation in the scheme. In this way, patients are “dumped” into private health insurance plans that they would not otherwise be able to afford.

What Benefit Do the Third Party “Enticers” Receive?