North Iowa Nursing Home Cited for Insufficient Staff After Resident’s Death

A Mason City nursing home has been cited again for having an insufficient level of staffing after a resident death earlier this year.

As first reported by the Iowa Capital Dispatch, state records show a resident at Good Shepherd Health Center died in August after sustaining numerous injuries that doctors described as “suspicious in nature.”  As a result, the facility has been cited by the state for failing to provide residents with adequate nursing services as well as insufficient staffing.

State records show that a male resident fell to the floor and immediately complained of pain in his ribs on August 13th. A state inspector’s report states the nurse on duty failed to immediately evaluate the man and opted not to send him to the hospital, which the nurse told inspectors doesn’t always happen if there’s only one supervisor in the building and 165 residents.

When the resident was taken to the hospital three hours later, doctors found fractures in his vertebrae, left clavicle and shoulder; 14 separate fractures among his ribs; plus a punctured and collapsed lung. An ER doctor said he had never seen someone who had a ground-level fall sustain those types of injuries and they struck him as suspicious.

The man died four days later on August 17th. 

Good Shepherd’s staffing levels were also an issue in a 2016 wrongful death case that resulted in a $900,000 judgment against the facility.