Failure to Honor Resident Food and Drink Preferences
Penalty
Summary
The facility failed to honor residents' drink and food preferences, as revealed through observations and interviews with residents and staff. During a group interview, residents expressed dissatisfaction with the lack of availability of preferred items such as soda, dippy eggs, hot dogs, sausage, kielbasa, and ice cream. They reported that soda was only available when they were sick, and they were denied requests for these items, leading to feelings of joylessness. The Dietary Manager and Nursing Home Administrator confirmed that the facility's menu, determined by corporate, did not include these items due to budget constraints and safety concerns. The Dietary Manager mentioned that she sometimes used her own money to purchase requested items, and there was no facility policy regarding hot dogs as a choking hazard, despite a past choking incident.
Plan Of Correction
1. Residents' drink and food preferences will be honored depending on the resident's diet order and menu's availabilities. 2. Current residents will be reviewed for completion of food preference data collection. Residents and residents' families may bring in desired food and drinks. 3. Facility do not honor tubular food as relation to a choking hazard in other facility. Facility will provide same substance of tubular food, but not in tubular forms. Company did not developed a policy in regards to the facility not serving tubular meats. 4. Dietary and Nursing staff will receive training by the Nursing Home Administrator or designee on food preferences and will be reviewed upon admission, annually and as needed. 5. The Certified Dietary Manager or designee will conduct quality review of three resident meals weekly X 4 weeks, then monthly as needed to ascertain that food preferences are being honored. 6. Dietary Manager or designee to present findings of rounds/audits along with root cause analysis of any identified issues with findings to be reviewed to the Quality Assurance Performance Improvement Committee Meeting monthly for further analysis and corrective actions.