A nursing home resident is alleging that staff members at his long-term care facility failed to give him his vital medication. Richard Ward claims that the staff at Life Care Center of Plano failed to administer blood-thinners that were necessary to avoid clotting. Ward entered the home after suffering two heart attacks in five days. A retired Army emergency medicine physician’s assistant, Ward asked staff questions after he began feeling worse while at the home. When he asked the medication technician what pills he was being given, the person replied that they were the ones his doctor wanted him to take. When Ward finally saw a doctor, two days into his stay, the doctor found that his blood clotting time had dropped, against specific instructions from Ward’s doctors. That is when the doctor realized that Ward was not being given either of his prescribed blood thinning medications. Later, after a battle about receiving these necessary medications, Ward failed to receive a shot that was supposed to be administered every 12 hours. The shot, which was to be injected at 5 am, was not administered until almost 10 am, and only after Ward had to complain. The next round, that evening, was again late and when Ward inquired, a technician told him no injection had been ordered, but when he forced them to look at their book, the technician realized the medication had in fact been ordered.
After ending his stay early, Ward requested his medical records from the facility, which showed numerous discrepancies. In the report, Ward was called by three different names: Thomas, Robert, and Richard. One page showed that he was received his medications on the first day he arrived, but the original order form showed that those medications were never even ordered, and another page proved that the doctor had made the orders two days later. Ward said his biggest fear in this whole ordeal is for people who do not have medical backgrounds and can not ensure for their own care. Read more about how Ward made an official complaint with his state’s Department of Aging and Disability Services here.
