The daughter of a former patient at a Pikesville nursing home has filed a lawsuit against the home, alleging that her mother was battered, scalded with hot coffee and neglected by the staff.
Brenda Rhett Robinson alleges that her mother, Daisy S. Rhett, suffered as the result of a series of incidents over the course of her seven-year stay at the former Pikesville Nursing and Convalescent Center on Sudbrook Lane.
The suit, filed in Baltimore County Circuit Court, names as defendants Pikesville Nursing and Convalescent Center Inc. and Ruxton Health Care Inc., the Columbia firm that owns the facility.
Eamonn Reilly, president of Ruxton Health Care, said the company purchased the nursing home in September and that Rhett was given adequate care from that point until her death Jan. 4.
"We believe that the care she received during our ownership was appropriate," Reilly said.
Ruxton changed the name of the facility to Ruxton Health and Rehabilitation Center of Pikesville, Reilly said.
However, Lois A. F. McBride, the lawyer for Rhett's estate, said that when Ruxton purchased the facility, the firm assumed liability for Rhett's treatment by the previous owners.
McBride said that Rhett died from natural causes unrelated to any of the problems and that her family kept her in the home because they had trouble finding a suitable replacement and making financial arrangements for her transfer.
Rhett was 88 and suffering from dementia and depression when she was admitted to the home Feb. 16, 1994. She needed help bathing and dressing and required waist restraints to keep her in a wheelchair, according to the suit.
But she was battered by a nursing aide Feb. 22, 1995, sent unattended to a medical appointment in March 1999 and had "scalding hot coffee" spilled on her Dec. 24, 1999, the suit alleges.
McBride said that her client could not recall the name of the nursing aide responsible for the battery. However, she said the aide was convicted of battery in District Court in 1995.
The suit alleges that the state Department of Health and Mental Hygiene cited the home in 1999 for sending Rhett -- who was 93 and suffering from dementia at the time -- to the medical appointment unattended.
The suit also alleges that Rhett fell out of her wheelchair March 1, 2000, suffering abrasions and wounds to her head and was "left lying on the floor in her room for a significant period of time before she received any assistance."
The incidents "evidence a pattern of neglect, negligence, dereliction of duty, breach of contract, false advertising and unfair or deceptive trade practices," according to the suit, which seeks unspecified damages.
