Failure to Provide Timely and Dignified Meal Service
Penalty
Summary
The deficiency involves the facility’s failure to provide dignified and timely meal service to one cognitively intact resident. During continuous observation, the resident was assisted to a table in the restorative dining room at 1:04 PM while another resident at the same table was already eating lunch. By 1:17 PM, a CNA informed the resident that staff were looking for her lunch tray. The resident, who had a diagnosis including a displaced intertrochanteric fracture of the left femur and required set-up assistance with meals per her care plan, stated she did not want to be a bother and offered to return to her room without eating. The CNA encouraged her to stay, but the meal tray still did not arrive. At 1:24 PM, another CNA offered the resident a cup of watermelon to eat while waiting for her meal tray, and the resident again expressed that she did not want to be a bother and could go back to her room. A third CNA then assisted the resident in filling out a lunch order on a menu form. The resident’s lunch tray was not delivered until 1:33 PM. Staff interviews confirmed that residents should be served promptly at mealtime and that the resident waited an excessive amount of time for her tray, with staff unable to explain what went wrong or provide updates while the tray was being sought on the hall tray cart or in the kitchen. The DON reported that the facility did not have a policy addressing timely meal service, and the existing Resident Rights Guidelines policy stated that residents have a right to be treated with dignity and respect.
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