Sen. Chuck Grassley is pursuing solutions to the problem of humiliating social media posts of nursing home residents by nursing home workers. The news outlet ProPublica has documented 47 incidents across the country since 2012 in which nursing home workers posted such photos of nursing home residents on social media. Three of the incidents were in Iowa – in Johnston, Ames and Hubbard.
Since Grassley became involved, the leading nursing home industry association responded to his letter and put out detailed guidance to its members about the social media abuse problem. The inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services alerted 50 State Medicaid Fraud Control Units to be increasingly aware of the problem and investigate allegations accordingly. The Justice Department expressed concern, noting that protecting seniors from abuse is one of its highest priorities. Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat also expressed concern.
Now, in perhaps the most significant development yet, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services put out a detailed memo to nursing home safety inspectors explaining that social media exploitation is a prohibited form of abuse. Grassley made the following comment.
“This guidance is welcome and necessary. Nursing homes are obligated under the law to keep their residents free from abuse. Exploitation on social media is a form of abuse, and the agency memo makes that clear. We need to prevent it, and we need to punish it when it happens. I appreciate the emphasis on training for all staff who provide care and services to residents, as well as the need to report the abuse to law enforcement and to encourage staff to report abuse, and the requirement for State Survey Agencies to conduct compliance reviews to ensure protective policies are in place. While the vast majority of nursing home staff will never exploit residents this way, the rules ought to be crystal clear across the board. I’ll continue working on this problem with CMS, the Justice Department, the Department of Health and Human Services, the respective Inspectors General, the states, the nursing home industry, the social media companies and investigative media outlets such as ProPublica.”
