Well ya little peep there's some discrepancies that need ta be gone over a bit.
Age is a little imprtant when you're talking about CPR because of tha damage that can happen. In normal young peeps the practice can break bones in the sternum. Now if you're 87 just imagine tha level a damage and the complications. Yowch.
There are various forms of CPR that are for various ages, from infancy to elderly.
Tha problem with the issues of legality is that the law doesn't actually allow hands-on nursing ta be given to residents who aren't in skilled nursing facilities like nursing homes. Furthermore tha state and the federal Departments a' Health don't license or regulate independendent living or assisted living homes like tha Glenwood place.
Emergency care such as CPR is not "hands-on nursing". It is emergency care no matter where it occurs; nursing home, independent living facility, the street, a private home, the local Y, etc.
Nice to see that the article you provided stated that there was NO DNR contrary to what you stated earlier. I do have to wonder about the author claiming to be both a nurse and an attorney. Will have to try to find time to look into that. I really like this paragraph though.
The press reports that there was no Do Not Resuscitate (DNR) direction in place. It’s a good thing for the facility’s owner Brookdale Senior Living that Ms. Bayliss’s family believed that she wanted “to die naturally and without any kind of life prolonging intervention” as they told the Associated Press. Brookdale’s policy about what the nurse should do in an emergency was sufficiently unclear that Brookdale’s public statement was to the effect that the nurse had “misinterpreted the company’s guidelines.” That sounds like “CYA” in case a family member later changes his or her mind and wants to blame Brookdale for not doing CPR
.
Not what they said at first.
http://www.krdo.com/news/Calif-woman-dies-after-nurse-refuses-to-perform-CPR/-/417220/19171238/-/149kd5r/-/index.html said:
The executive director of Glenwood Gardens, Jeffrey Toomer, defended the nurse's actions, saying she did indeed follow policy.
"In the event of a health emergency at this independent living community our practice is to immediately call emergency medical personnel for assistance and to wait with the individual needing attention until such personnel arrives," Toomer said in a written statement. "That is the protocol we followed."
Then there is this line in the article you cited:
It’s not so bad to exit the way Lorraine did, fast, and probably without pain.
Really? When she was gasping for breath for around 7 minutes off and on and she was alive enough to later die at the hospital? Doesn't sound very fast or painless to me.
If what the nurse did was obviously illegal she woulda been charged already.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/04/nursing-home-cpr-case_n_2804575.html said:
A nurse's refusal to give CPR to a dying 87-year-old woman at a California independent living home despite desperate pleas from a 911 dispatcher has prompted outrage and spawned a criminal investigation.
So right there an investigation is underway. The "nurse" may not have yet been charged because the investigation is not complete. At least as of 10 days ago when the article was published, 4 days prior to the article you provided. Still looking for more info.
Maybe the government should license and regulate private and independent non-nursing homes peep? :sun
same article said:
She lived in the independent living building, which state officials said is like a senior apartment complex and doesn't operate under licensing oversight.
So the facility itself is not a licensed facility and probably doesn't offer up any medical care per se'. Something I noted as a possibility earlier. Irrelevant to my point. However, I can agree that there might be something to considering such for these facilities. But not everything that deals with the elderly should automatically require licensing and mandated medical care. Can you imagine the sudden drop in senior citizen sales in the retail market?
This goes to one of my other points:
State officials did not know Monday whether the woman who talked to the 911 dispatcher actually was a nurse, or just identified herself as one during the call.
If she is not a licensed nurse then there is no violation of law to worry about. In fact the law allows for people not to act, but only the general population. The licensed medical providers are still required to.
I did find this:
http://smmercury.com/2013/03/13/freethought-san-marcos-cpr-and-end-of-life-decisions/ said:
The elderly woman’s family said she was aware that the facility did not offer trained medical staff, yet opted to live there anyway:
That article is only 4 days old and seems to indicate that the "nurse" was nothing of the sort, at least as far a licensing goes. In which case she should be fine legally. However, that still does not change the fact of law requiring those who ARE licensed to perform aid regardless of place, location or anything outside of being physically unable to get there or a DNR.
I am attempting to get ahold of my EMT's again to get a more direct referencing to the laws that they told me about so that others will have a reference.