Nurse Charged With Patient Neglect And Cover-up At Ontario County Nursing Home
June Allen, 40, of Maple Avenue in Victor, was arraigned this morning in Canandaigua City Court before Judge Steven D. Aronson. She has been charged with ten counts of Wilful Violation of Health Laws and ten counts of Falsifying Business Records in the Second Degree. If convicted, she faces up to one year in prison.
Spitzer said, "Entrusted with the care of our most vulnerable citizens, the defendant failed to give crucial breathing and heart medication to two patients. In addition, she failed to give a pneumonia vaccination to a third - even though pneumonia is a common cause of death among elderly nursing home patients. It is obvious, based on her actions, that Allen showed little concern for her patients' well-being and should never again work with patients in a health care setting."
While working at the Elm Manor Nursing Home in Canandaigua on February 21, 2000, Allen failed to administer a prescribed pneumonia vaccine to an 87-year-old patient suffering from Parkinson's disease. The following day, Allen failed to remove a nitroglycerin patch from the arm of a 78-year-old patient with coronary heart disease. The patch, which dilates the arteries to improve coronary blood flow, is to be changed each day.
In April, Allen neglected a 76-year-old patient suffering from congestive heart failure and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease by failing to give the patient, on eight separate occasions, her prescribed medications. The patient had been ordered by her physician to receive a combivent inhaler (to open her airway) four times a day, and a steroid inhaler (medication) twice a day.
To conceal her crimes, Allen falsely wrote on the patients' medical charts that she had dispensed the medications and treatments.
The Attorney General thanked the State Health Department for referring the matter to his office. He also thanked the staff and administration of the Elm Manor Nursing Home for their assistance and cooperation throughout the investigation.
Allen worked at the Elm Manor Nursing Home, located at 210 North Main Street in Canandaigua, from March 1996 to April 1998.
Special Assistant Attorney General Timothy J. McFarland, of the Rochester Regional Office of the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit, is prosecuting the case. All cases are handled under the direct supervision of Deputy Attorney General Jos? Maldonado.
The charges against Allen are accusations, and she is presumed innocent until proven guilty.