A Kentucky nursing home resident developed a serious periodontal infection because care providers allegedly never realized the person wore dentures and so hadn't removed them for six months, according to a story in the Lexington Herald-Leader.
The Kentucky Office of Inspector General for the Cabinet for Health and Family Services has cited Arbor Place of Clinton for the incident, and the nursing home has lost its federal funding and will close temporarily, according to the story.
The resident's guardian told state investigators that nursing home staff were informed that two front teeth were missing on the resident's dentures when the resident was admitted last May.
But staff members wrote in the resident's records that the teeth were natural, according to the citation issued by the state in February. From June 2010 until January 15 of this year, when the resident's face began to swell, there was no mention of dentures in the resident's records, and it wasn't until nine days after symptoms first occurred that a dentist examined the resident and found that the dentures "had not been removed for a very long time," according to the story.
Noting that previous studies (American Journal of Nursing, June 2009, Vol. 109:6, pp. 44-50) have shown many nursing home residents suffer from dental neglect, which can have a negative impact on overall health, researchers from the University of Kentucky are launching a small pilot study to see whether training even one staff member can improve the oral care of residents, the Herald-Leader reported.
