Cameras have become an important tool for families who suspect abuse in senior care facilities.
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| David Joles - Star Tribune file |
At 2 a.m.
on a November morning, Shirley Breitman began to scream for help from
the bed of her assisted-living facility in St. Louis Park.
Her pained
cries were streamed live to the smartphones of Breitman’s two adult
children — Richard in Minneapolis and Laurie in Los Angeles — through an
internet-connected camera placed in her bedroom. Within minutes,
Richard was on the phone with the facility’s nursing staff, asking them
to check on their 98-year-old mother, who has advanced dementia and was
experiencing an adverse reaction to new medication.
“Once you
install one of these cameras, you can’t imagine living without it,” said
Breitman, an attorney. “It gives you peace of mind knowing that another
set of eyes is on our mother.”
In recent
years, a raft of new video surveillance technology has made it possible
for families to monitor the daily movements and care of their aging
relatives with remarkable clarity and precision. Yet Minnesota law has
long been silent on whether people actually had the right to install
such equipment in residents’ rooms at care facilities, an omission that
sowed confusion and conflicts between families and senior homes.
Now, after years of legal wrangling, state law is finally clear:
Minnesotans have the right to use electronic monitoring devices in most
senior care facilities, provided they notify the facility and obtain
consent from residents being monitored. Effective this month, nursing
homes and assisted-living facilities across the state are required to
inform residents of their right to use the cameras.
The small,
internet-enabled cameras can bring peace of mind to families who
suspect abuse of a loved one, or who simply want to keep better tabs on
their care. The remote monitoring systems, which can be purchased online
for less than $200, have become increasingly sophisticated. People can
now receive automatic alerts to their smartphones when someone enters a
loved one’s room, or when there is unusual activity or sound.
Breitman said the streaming videos are so vivid that, on a recent morning, he could see the type of food aides left for his mother as well as the quality of the bandages on her injured wrist. “It’s stunningly good,” Breitman said as he watched the video feed.
But not all seniors want
to live under round-the-clock surveillance. Last year, elder care
advocates, industry representatives and state health officials struggled
to work out a compromise between invasion of privacy and fears of
resident abuse. The result is a complicated set of new reporting
requirements and some confusion over how the new law
will be implemented. Some advocates worry that the bevy of new rules
will discourage the very surveillance it was designed to protect and
that some people may be subject to retaliation for using the devices.
Modeled
after legislation in Illinois, Minnesota’s law requires that families
obtain the resident’s consent to the use of a camera and notify the
facility of their plans. If a resident occupies a shared room, the
roommate must also provide consent. In cases where senior residents are
too frail or cognitively impaired to give consent, relatives must fill
out a 9-page form with a written statement from a medical professional.
The prior
notification requirements also have advocates worried about possible
retaliation. In the past, families who suspected abuse or neglect of a
loved one could put hidden cameras in their loved one’s room without
ever telling facility staff. In many cases, families would take this
step as a last resort, when attempts to work out problems with facility
staff had failed, advocates noted.
Now,
however, residents or family members who install a surveillance camera
without first notifying the facility and completing the required consent
forms are violating state law. The new law does allow for an exception:
If a resident or family member fears retaliation, they can install the
device for two weeks without notifying the facility, provided they
submit a special form to the Office of the Ombudsman of Long-Term Care.
Jean Peters, president of Elder Voice Family Advocates,
a nonprofit that advocates for safe and quality care in long-term care
facilities, said the new law and its bevy of new rules are
“unnecessarily punitive” and leave families vulnerable to retaliation.
“All people want to do is
monitor the care of their loved ones, to make sure they are getting what
they are paying for,” Peters said. “These reporting requirements will
have a chilling effect on families.”
Sean Burke, public policy director at the Minnesota Elder Justice Center,
which helped craft the regulations, acknowledged that some families may
find the new paperwork overly burdensome. But, he said, the state had
to respect the privacy rights of seniors, including those who may be
incapable of understanding that they are being filmed.
“With this
new technology, it’s literally like ‘The Truman Show,’ ” Burke said.
“You are putting [your loved one’s] entire life on film, potentially,
including their most intimate cares. That is an awesome power.”
Staff tampered with camera
Allegations
of abuse in senior homes are notoriously hard to prove, and hidden
cameras are one of the few ways that families can corroborate claims by
elderly relatives. Increasingly, the footage is also being used by law
enforcement officials and state health regulators, in some cases to
bring criminal charges.
Across Minnesota, many seniors and their relatives are learning about the technology for the first time. Care Providers of Minnesota,
a long-term care industry trade group, is urging its member facilities
to include information about the new law in admissions packets for new
residents.
“Eventually, everyone should be educated,” said Patti Cullen, president and chief executive of Care Providers.
Lisa
Papp-Richards is among the first to take advantage of the new law. Three
years ago, she tried to install a camera in the Bemidji nursing home
where her 77-year-old mother lived after she noticed a sudden decline in
her health without any clear explanation. Soon, however, facility staff
began tampering with the camera — even placing a towel over it — and
eventually seized the camera without her consent. The family filed a
police report alleging theft.
Last week,
emboldened by the new law, Papp-Richards reinstalled the camera in the
same place, high atop a wooden cabinet, with a clear view of her
mother’s room. Already, she is checking the video stream on her
smartphone four to five times a day, and she’s noticed an improvement in
her mother’s mental well-being. Her mother, she said, has become “more
relaxed” knowing that her daughter is keeping a closer watch on her
care. On the video feed, Papp-Richards could see staff joking and
interacting well with her mother, which helped assuage worries that her
mother was being left alone.
“At my
mother’s age, things can change in an instant, so it’s vitally important
to be able to react immediately,” Papp-Richards said. “The cameras are a
reassuring, last line of defense.”
Full Article & Source:
Minnesota law gives green light to safety surveillance cameras in senior homes
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