THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, July 13, 1996 TAG: 9607130178
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY DEBRA GORDON, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: 138 lines
Leaders of several organizations that work with the region's elderly are concerned about a new local volunteer group that is soliciting complaints about nursing homes but hasn't said what it plans to do with the information.
The group, called The Citizens Committee to Protect the Elderly, was started by about 10 people, at least one of whom works with the elderly.
Committee chairman Robert Sheldon said they formed it because they are dissatisfied with the quality of the area's nursing homes, and they feel that official agencies aren't doing enough to improve them.
``People are frustrated and disappointed by a system that isn't serving them,'' he said.
In the four months since the group opened its office on Bonney Road in Virginia Beach, it has received hundreds of complaints and raised $13,000 through donations, according to Sheldon and board member Bernadette Ambolo.
Board members contributed start-up funds, but most of the recent donations came from people who have called to complain about the care provided in the homes. Ambolo said the group doesn't actively solicit donations, but it will accept them.
The group has spent about $5,000 for newspaper advertisements. It distributes brochures and fliers at bingo games and other places where older citizens meet, and has a Web site on the Internet.
The brochures and ads include the group's phone number and invite people to call: ``Please contact us if you are disappointed with the care your loved one is receiving in a nursing home or assisted living facility.''
The group is collecting these stories in a database, Sheldon said. Currently, the committee is not trying to find out if the complaints are true or not, he said.
Eventually, it plans to make ``people's perceptions'' about the region's nursing homes available to the public, he said. The group is meeting with lawyers to find out how it can legally release that information, he said.
Sheldon declined to explain how the group plans to use the information or release it to the public, other than to say their methods would be ``untraditional.''
He said organizers have been deliberately vague about their plans. ``There's power in people not knowing what we're going to do with the information,'' he said.
``We feel we would be more effective and have more firepower down the road if we creep up on the industry rather than have these full-blown exposes of what we're planning and doing.''
That preference for secrecy worries advocates like Kathleen S. Blanchard, who chairs two organizations for the elderly, the Norfolk Task Force on Aging and the Norfolk Long-Term Care Coordination Committee.
``I'm very worried that people will take them as someone who has an authority and will spill their story out to them, but it's not clear what will happen with the components of their story,'' Blanchard said.
``Or, in fact, if there would be confidences broken.''
State and local agencies are careful to protect the identities of those who criticize care in nursing homes because residents could suffer retribution for complaining.
Sheldon criticized the effectiveness of organizations like the Norfolk Task Force, which is composed of members representing agencies and institutions that serve the region's elderly.
``I sometimes have difficulty differentiating the Task Force on Aging from the (nursing home) industry itself,'' he said.
Blanchard is particularly concerned that people will think the citizens' committee can solve problems in nursing homes, and so won't contact official agencies that oversee the state's nursing homes.
Sheldon's group has said it plans to act as a ``liaison'' between families and official agencies or the nursing homes to resolve problems.
His committee, like any volunteer advocacy organization, has no power to force changes in nursing home care. Only the state Health Department or the federal government can act against nursing homes if the homes are found to be abusing or neglecting residents.
Virginia already has a state ombudsman program in Richmond, which tries to solve nursing home disputes through mediation. All nursing homes are required by law to post the ombudsman's toll-free number.
Because there is no ombudsman office in Hampton Roads, the Richmond office usually refers callers to the health department or other agencies.
State ombudsman Mark Miller said grass-roots advocacy groups like the Citizen's Committee can be a good thing, particularly in Hampton Roads, which doesn't have a local ombudsman program.
In Harrisonburg, for instance, which also doesn't have a local ombudsman program, the Friends and Relatives of Nursing Home Residents provides information and support to people with relatives in nursing homes.
That organization works closely with other local groups for the elderly, and with the state ombudsman office and health department.
Miller said he was concerned that Sheldon's committee is seeking to bypass the existing system for dealing with nursing home problems before giving it a chance to work.
Miller is also concerned that the group encourages nursing home employees to call.
``They're just going to get all those disgruntled people that have things to say,'' he said.
The group has declined several invitations to speak to Hampton Roads community groups which serve the elderly. That has puzzled and upset advocates for the elderly.
``This could be a very good approach to resolving issues of poor care,'' said Marilyn Fall, who has invited the group to speak at the Virginia Beach Mayor's Committee for the Aging, of which she is a member. ``But my concern is that they don't make themselves available to the organizations that are working with the elderly and that have concerns for the elderly.''
Sheldon said the group has turned down the invitations because the advocacy groups meet at inconvenient times, or because the committee was still too new. Most groups meet during the day.
Sheldon did speak before a local chapter of the American Association for Retired Persons, AARP, earlier this week. District Chairman Gordon Morton said Sheldon's talk did nothing to allay his concerns.
``A lot of people seem to think there's a lot of mystery behind it. Why are they doing this when there is a system that can take care of these problems?'' Morton said.
Ambolo said the committee's volunteers tell callers to contact appropriate state agencies with their complaints and even give callers the phone numbers.
However, Ruth Songer, 76, of Norfolk, said she called the group this spring to complain about the care she received in a Virginia Beach nursing home. When she called, she said, a volunteer asked if she had reported the incident to anyone else.
``I said I didn't know who to report it to, and they said they would look into it,'' Songer said.
The committee didn't give her any other phone numbers to call, she said.
Songer, who now lives in a Norfolk apartment, has since offered to volunteer for the group, and said she wants to contribute money to it.
Ambolo said she has no idea why the information wasn't given to Songer. Some callers say they don't want information about official agencies, she said.
``They don't feel it will do any good.''
Sheldon, a retired career consultant from Virginia Beach, formed the committee with Ambolo, who was director of nursing in two Virginia Beach nursing homes. Ambolo, of Virginia Beach, has her own business as a geriatric care planner, helping families coordinate medical care for their elderly relatives.
Ambolo filed papers for the group to receive nonprofit status in 1991 under the name, Citizens' Committee for Fair Medical Practices Inc.
Sheldon said they didn't activate the organization until earlier this year, because of time constraints on the board members.
Other board members include Elizabeth Brickhouse, executive director for The Haven Family Shelter in Norfolk, and Trish Manthey, executive director for The Dwelling Place, also in Norfolk.
Financial documents filed with the Virginia Consumer Affairs Office show the group spent $2,093 in 1995, and raised $1,160 in contributions.
Ambolo said the money was spent on supplies, equipment and accountant fees. by CNB