GAO reports vet had maggots in his wound at Armed Forces Retirement Home

[Holly_Hobby]

Pentagon Is Probing Veterans Home
Increased Deaths, Grim Conditions Reported by GAO

By Steve Vogel and Michael E. Ruane
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, March 22, 2007; Page A01

Reports of a rising death rate and rooms spattered with blood, urine and feces at the Armed Forces Retirement Home prompted the Pentagon yesterday to begin investigating conditions at the veterans facility in Northwest Washington.

The Government Accountability Office warned the Pentagon this week that residents of the home "may be at risk" in light of allegations of severe health-care problems. Residents have been admitted to Walter Reed Army Medical Center with "the most serious type of pressure sores" and, in one case, with maggots in a wound, according to a GAO letter sent to the Defense Department.

...

The reports came from medical personnel who treat residents at the historic veterans home, formerly known as the U.S. Soldiers' and Airmen's Home. The facility, run by an independent federal agency under the jurisdiction of the Department of Defense, is home to more than 1,100 enlisted retirees, many of them veterans of World War II, Korea and Vietnam.

The Pentagon sent a team of four doctors on an unscheduled visit yesterday morning to view the conditions and speak to officials and residents. The team was appointed Tuesday in response to the letter sent a day earlier to Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates by David M. Walker, the comptroller general and head of the GAO.

...

During a tour of the home yesterday, Cox confirmed that a resident had been found in August with maggots in a leg wound. Cox said the man was "noncompliant and combative," and did not want his dressing changed.

Cox said the dressing should have been changed anyway. Eight employees were eventually fired because of the incident, he said. The man, who was 87, later died of causes unrelated to the wound. "It was an isolated incident," Cox said.

...

Read the rest of the article, the budget was cut to the bone. This is horrendous.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/21/AR2007032101470.html

[Monkeyman]

1. Yep its going to get worse

[MadMaddie]

3. This really is the twilight zone

<snip>
Cox said the man was "noncompliant and combative," and did not want his dressing changed.
<snip>

Regardless of if the patient was combative, common sense dictates that if there are maggots in the wound sedate the patient.

What the hell is wrong with these people managing these facilities. Simply criminal. If if happens in a civilian facility people go to jail.

[Horse with no Name]

2. What is the worst part

Is that a healing wound should be new flesh.
Maggots ONLY eat dead flesh.
The smell had to be horrendous.
On edit:
I was thinking I had read something about this before but thought that it was about leeches.
However, it is about maggots. But obviously these would need to be laboratory raised maggots and not ones that occur in filthy conditions.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23387228-details/Maggot+treatment+'could+save+NHS+billions'/article.do
>>>snip
Using maggots to eat the dead flesh on wounds could help prevent the spread of MRSA and save the NHS millions of pounds, according to MPs.

In a parliamentary motion, 35 MPs from all parties backed a call for doctors to use fly larvae to treat patients' wounds.

They said maggots take only five days to clean a wound compared to 89 with traditional treatment, meaning hospital beds would become free more quickly.

Maggots were commonly used in hospitals right from medieval times down to the beginning of the last century, when they were phased out with the introduction of antibiotics. Maggots only eat dead flesh and leave healthy tissue intact.

>>>snip
However, average cleaning times for maggots is only five days, the motion states. So-called 'sterile maggots' eat the dead flesh from the wounds and kill bacteria.

[MadMaddie]

5. I would think that if I had maggots eating my flesh and I am looking

at it I would be combative too...

[Canuckistanian]

7. But maggot therapy is VOLUNTARY

Sound like this poor character had no choice.

[Horse with no Name]

10. I'm not advocating this at all

Just saying that there is literature on using laboratory grown sterile maggots for short-term debridement of wounds.
This surely wasn't under sterile conditions, nor was it short-term.
It has been used successfully in complicated antibiotic-resistant wound infections.
But saying this would be acceptable is to say that cutting off someone's arm with a table saw is an successful amputation.

[Canuckistanian]

12. Oh, I know you're not.

I'm not faulting you for saying it. And the therapy would probably help him, under the right circumstances.

But these aren't normal circumstances. A wound that is that unprotected is in danger of serious bacterial infection, gangrene, etc.

He should be so lucky the maggots got to him first.

[Jonathan50]

14. There was a scene in _Gladiator_

Where Russell Crowe has maggots in a wound on his shoulder and someone else tells him to leave them in there, they will help it heal.

[dflprincess]

4. There have been problems with the Vets homes in Minnesota as well

though I believe they are mostly state funded. Funding cuts, staff shortages, low employee morale and high turnover thanks to mandatory overtime and low wages. Per a recent article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune recently the annual top pay for an RN at these homes is $14,000 less than the top salary for a nurse at a hospital.

However, our illustrious Republican Governor, Tim ("no new taxes") Pawlenty has taken a brief break from sucking up to McCain (Timmy wants to be vice president) and decided perhaps these problems should be addressed.

[Monkeyman]

8. Yep wait till all the reports are out.

If you have the time here is 90 pages of only part of the report

http://vawatchdog.org/07/nf07/nfMAR07/MARFILES/VA%20Enviro%20of%20Care%20Report.pdf

[riderinthestorm]

6. Didn't you get the memo? Maggots are the latest technique

for cleaning out a wound? The Rethugs are all about supporting the troops and those troops are only getting the best except for perhaps some peeling wallpaper at Building 18 :sarcasm:

:nuke: :nuke: :nuke:

[Rockholm]

9. They really are good for some wounds.

Doubtful this was the reason here.

[riderinthestorm]

11. Yeah I knew that, I was just playing on the recent studies on the value for maggots

for skin debridement and how the Veterans Homes will seize upon anything to justify what is obviously not a case of advanced medicine but poor care.

I find it fascinating actually that maggots are actually being taken seriously as a treatment option. Old wives tales and home remedies and their grains of truth....

[Monkeyman]

13. Blood Letting Works Replug talking points

[Mend]

15. no one's wounds should get to the maggot stage....modern

medicine prevents such rot. And no one's mental health should be allowed to deteriorate to non-compliant and combative....modern medicine prevents that rot, too.

[Horse with no Name]

18. They shouldn't

But they do. On both counts.:(

[Jonathan50]

16. Here's what Kipling had to say about it........ some things never change.

Rudyard Kipling

Tommy

I went into a public-'ouse to get a pint o'beer,
The publican 'e up an' sez, "We serve no red-coats here."
The girls be'ind the bar they laughed an' giggled fit to die,
I outs into the street again an' to myself sez I:

O it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, go away";
But it's ``Thank you, Mister Atkins,'' when the band begins to play,
The band begins to play, my boys, the band begins to play,
O it's ``Thank you, Mr. Atkins,'' when the band begins to play.

I went into a theatre as sober as could be,
They gave a drunk civilian room, but 'adn't none for me;
They sent me to the gallery or round the music-'alls,
But when it comes to fightin', Lord! they'll shove me in the stalls!

For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, wait outside";
But it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide,
The troopship's on the tide, my boys, the troopship's on the tide,
O it's "Special train for Atkins" when the trooper's on the tide.

Yes, makin' mock o' uniforms that guard you while you sleep
Is cheaper than them uniforms, an' they're starvation cheap;
An' hustlin' drunken soldiers when they're goin' large a bit
Is five times better business than paradin' in full kit.

Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy how's yer soul?"
But it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll,
The drums begin to roll, my boys, the drums begin to roll,
O it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll.

We aren't no thin red 'eroes, nor we aren't no blackguards too,
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you;
An' if sometimes our conduck isn't all your fancy paints:
Why, single men in barricks don't grow into plaster saints;

While it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, fall be'ind,"
But it's "Please to walk in front, sir," when there's trouble in the wind,
There's trouble in the wind, my boys, there's trouble in the wind,
O it's "Please to walk in front, sir," when there's trouble in the wind.

You talk o' better food for us, an' schools, an' fires an' all:
We'll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.
Don't mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face
The Widow's Uniform is not the soldier-man's disgrace.

For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Chuck him out, the brute!"
But it's "Saviour of 'is country," when the guns begin to shoot;
An' it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' anything you please;
But Tommy ain't a bloomin' fool - you bet that Tommy sees!

[Rosemary2205]

17. I hope this is not the future of socialized medicine in America.

The nursing homes are already bad enough in this country. We don't need them THIS bad.