Barstow Veterans Home Moves to Regain Funding

The state-run veterans home in Barstow has cleared an important preliminary obstacle in its fight to restore its federal financial support, but it faces a difficult path ahead for final approval, state officials said Thursday.

About $5 million was cut off in the spring and summer of 2000 when the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services ruled that nursing home patients in Barstow had been put “at risk” by substandard care and poor management, and withdrew the home’s certification.

As the high desert home for aging and ailing military veterans struggled to rehabilitate itself, the Legislature and Gov. Gray Davis enacted emergency appropriations to partially offset the loss of federal aid.

Spokesman Jerry Jones of the Veterans Affairs Department said Thursday that officials were “very pleased” at the outcome of the first test to restore federal approval of the nursing home and are “very confident” that the facility will soon win full certification.

At the state Department of Health Services, which conducted an inspection on behalf of the federal government, spokesman Ken August said evaluators found the nursing home to be in “substantial compliance” with federal standards.

“There was no actual harm to patients, no evidence of substandard care and no immediate jeopardy to residents,” August said.

However, the report said that inspectors did find deficiencies and that the home has taken steps to remedy them. The flaws included inattention to patients’ bed sores and failure to closely follow physician orders in obtaining and administering medication.

The preliminary inspection occurred in November and examined problems uncovered by a series of investigations in spring 2000, including the death of a World War II Army sergeant who choked on broccoli while eating lunch.

Officials at the home failed to file a timely report of the man’s death, then listed the cause as a heart attack. The coroner concluded that he had gagged on chunks of broccoli that stuck in his windpipe, a finding that paralleled the report of a physician who tried to save him.

Officials said the Barstow home will operate for 60 days in a test to determine whether its reforms comply with federal standards.

After the test, the facility will undergo a far more comprehensive evaluation.

The Barstow home opened in 1996 as a state-of-the-art facility for veterans. Complaints about patient care soon followed, but after prolonged investigations the nursing home managed to keep its license.

Within a few months, however, the federal Department of Veterans Affairs and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services decertified the home and halted payments of an estimated $5 million in Medi-Cal, Medicare and certain veterans funds.

The Barstow nursing home has 87 patients, with 115 at the complex living independently or with minor assistance.