Family of injured Oakwood resident sues

Local News

June 1, 2007

State says lawsuit against Liberty Healthcare is none of its concern

By CHRIS HARRIS CJ Staff Writer The Commonwealth Journal Fri Jun 01, 2007, 09:32 AM EDT

Bluegrass Oakwood Community Center shouldn’t be affected by a lawsuit filed by the guardian of a client who was injured last summer.

According to a report in the Lexington Herald-Leader, Joseph Staples is suing the Pennsylvania-based firm Liberty Healthcare for over $1 million for injuries suffered by Richard Yonce Jr. of Louisville, for whom Staples serves as guardian. Staples filed the suit earlier this month.

While a copy of the suit was unable to be obtained, Gwenda Bond, spokesperson for the state’s Cabinet for Health and Family Services, was unaware of the development and said that neither the state nor Oakwood was involved if the lawsuit was between the plaintiff and Liberty Healthcare. She also said the state would not comment on any pending litigation.

Yonce was the Oakwood resident involved in the July 4, 2006, incident where an Oakwood worker crushed the client’s left testicle with his knee while trying to restrain him. Oakwood received a Type A citation over the unfortunate series of events last September, the facility’s 23rd such citation out of 24 received in 2005 and 2006. The workers involved were ultimately terminated.

According to the citation report, the incident occurred after the patient, who has a history of self-injurious behavior, “sat up in his bed, took off his helmet, was screaming and yelling and hit his head 10 times” and was “pushing and kicking towards staff.” A half-hour later, Yonce again allegedly exhibited the self-injurious behavior while in the bathroom and ran back to the bed.

“An attempt was made to block the client and he jumped back and his legs hit the bed and took the client off his feet,” said the citation, which also quoted the staff member as saying the client “grabbed me and my knee went between his legs on the mattress.”

The citation said that during the incident, the staff failed to utilize the proper procedures to deal with Yonce’s behavior as directed in the client’s positive behavior support plan.

“The staff stated that the client did not reveal any signs of pain,” stated the citation, and several opportunities occurred for him to do so. Yet around a half-hour later, the staff member said “I noticed the swelling. (The client’s) scrotal region (was) very swollen, very noticeable, reddish purple. I realized then that I may have caused the injury.”

There was no sign of additional injury between the time of the incident and the discovery of the swollen area on Yonce, according to the citation.

After determining that Yonce had a “fractured” left testicle, he was transferred to a hospital in Lexington where the testicle was surgically removed.

The lawsuit seeks the $1 million plus other damages, and alleges that Liberty didn’t properly train its employees and allowed them to continue to work at Oakwood while the situation was being investigated, contrary to state policy, according to the Herald-Leader report.

At the time Liberty Healthcare was managing Oakwood, most Oakwood workers were actually employees of the state of Kentucky, which oversees the mental health facility. Liberty Healthcare was in charge for a year, from November of 2005 to the beginning of November of last year, when the Lexington-based Bluegrass Mental Health-Mental Retardation Board took over. All Oakwood workers who were employees of the state began officially serving under Bluegrass at that point.

Most recently, Liberty filed court documents this week asking that the case be dismissed and claiming the two Oakwood workers were acting outside the scope of their employment, according to the Herald-Leader.

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