One-way bus tickets from Nevada Psychiatric Hospital
Asterisk on the Street
Posts: 835
Although this practice by the Nevada Psychiatric Hospital was uncovered in 2013, the pending lawsuit is being settled in October 2015. How were criminal charges not brought against Rawson-Neal for endangering mentally ill patients? It is mind-boggling.
sacbee.com/news/investigations/nevada-patient-busing/article2578750.html
"The state of Nevada and its primary psychiatric hospital “intentionally and wrongfully” foisted the cost of caring for indigent mentally ill people onto California cities and counties by issuing patients bus tickets out of town without making proper arrangements for their care, a lawsuit filed Tuesday in San Francisco charges.
San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera filed the class-action lawsuit against Nevada, Rawson-Neal Psychiatric Hospital in Las Vegas and state mental health administrators, seeking reimbursement for the care of indigent patients he said the system “dumped” onto California in an effort to save money.
“What the defendants have been doing for years is horribly wrong on two levels,” Herrera said in a written statement announcing the lawsuit. “It cruelly victimizes a defenseless population, and punishes jurisdictions for providing health and human services that others won’t provide.”
In addition to unspecified financial damages, the suit asks for a permanent injunction preventing Nevada from dispatching psychiatric patients to California unless they are residents of the destination city or county, are being sent to family members who have agreed to care for them, or are being sent to a medical facility where arrangements have been made for their treatment.
Mary Woods, spokeswoman for the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services, said Tuesday afternoon that her agency would have no immediate comment on the suit.
The action follows a formal demand Herrera issued last month to Nevada officials. He said he planned to take legal action within weeks unless the state reimbursed San Francisco $500,000 for care of patients he maintains were improperly bused to the city since 2008. Herrera said an investigation by his office had identified 24 patients who had been bused to San Francisco over the past five years, 20 of whom Herrera said required emergency treatment upon arrival.
Nevada’s attorney general responded this week with a letter arguing that San Francisco had offered insufficient evidence to justify its claim. Records gathered by state health officials and given to Herrera “demonstrate that the policies are appropriate and that only proper discharges were made,” reads the letter, sent Monday and signed by Chief Deputy Attorney General Linda Anderson.
Nevada’s mental health system has been in the spotlight for months, following a Sacramento Bee report published earlier this year that found Rawson-Neal had bused 1,500 mentally ill patients out of Southern Nevada from July 2008 through early March 2013. About 500 were given one-way tickets to California.
The Bee undertook its investigation after one of those patients, James Flavy Coy Brown, turned up suicidal and confused at a Sacramento homeless services complex after a 15-hour bus ride from Las Vegas to the capital city. Brown said he knew no one in Sacramento and that Rawson-Neal doctors advised him to dial 911 once he arrived in the city.
Nevada health officials have acknowledged that they erred in shipping Brown to Sacramento without any arrangements for care. But they contend his case was an exception and that the vast majority of patients bused from Rawson-Neal had family or treatment waiting for them on the other end of their journeys.
They said many of the patients bused to their “home states” were vacationers who suffered breakdowns or abused drugs. A Herrera spokesman disputed that explanation.
“This is about Nevada’s state-sanctioned practice of improperly transporting indigent psychiatric patients,” said Matt Dorsey. “It’s not about patients who travel voluntarily between Nevada and other states.”
The lawsuit filed Tuesday charges that Nevada sent mentally ill people to California in a manner that placed patients, their fellow Greyhound passengers and residents of the places where they landed in peril.
“All of the patients were transported without escorts,” and often without “adequate food, water and medication” to sustain them during lengthy bus trips. Because the hospital failed to make proper arrangements for their care, many of the patients “ended up on the streets of their destination cities without funds or means of support, shelter or medication,” the suit reads.
Although Nevada is required by state law to care for its poor and indigent, it sent patients out of state “and avoided expending its own public resources” to provide for them, it says.
..."
reuters.com/article/2015/10/06/us-usa-patients-dumping-idUSKCN0S02M020151006
"Nevada has agreed to pay the city of San Francisco $400,000 to settle a lawsuit claiming that the state bused patients, many of them poor and mentally ill, from a Las Vegas hospital to the Bay Area without plans for their care, Governor Brian Sandoval's office said on Tuesday.
The settlement, which must still be approved by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and the Nevada Board of Examiners, includes attorneys' fees and a plan for better management and transfer of patients.
"We look forward to working with California to ensure all patient transfers to and from both states are managed using these best practices and adhering to conditions detailed in the agreement," Sandoval's office said in a statement.
The San Francisco City Attorney's Office declined to confirm the proposed settlement or comment on the matter on Tuesday.
The state-run Rawson-Neal Psychiatric Hospital in Las Vegas came under fire in April 2013 after the Sacramento Bee newspaper reported that hospital staff had given as many as 1,500 patients one-way bus tickets to California and 46 other states between 2008 and 2013.
San Francisco's City Attorney Dennis Herrera said the hospital had sent at least two dozen patients to the city via Greyhound bus, adding that shortly after their arrival most of the patients required medical care and shelter costing some $500,000 in city funds.
Herrera filed the suit against Nevada in September 2013 and said it could pave the way for other California jurisdictions to seek restitution from the state for damages similar to those San Francisco claimed.
Nevada health officials acknowledged the hospital had shipped some discharged patients out of state without documenting adequate aftercare plans for food, housing, medication and treatment. They said two employees were fired and three others faced disciplinary action."
sacbee.com/news/investigations/nevada-patient-busing/article2578750.html
"The state of Nevada and its primary psychiatric hospital “intentionally and wrongfully” foisted the cost of caring for indigent mentally ill people onto California cities and counties by issuing patients bus tickets out of town without making proper arrangements for their care, a lawsuit filed Tuesday in San Francisco charges.
San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera filed the class-action lawsuit against Nevada, Rawson-Neal Psychiatric Hospital in Las Vegas and state mental health administrators, seeking reimbursement for the care of indigent patients he said the system “dumped” onto California in an effort to save money.
“What the defendants have been doing for years is horribly wrong on two levels,” Herrera said in a written statement announcing the lawsuit. “It cruelly victimizes a defenseless population, and punishes jurisdictions for providing health and human services that others won’t provide.”
In addition to unspecified financial damages, the suit asks for a permanent injunction preventing Nevada from dispatching psychiatric patients to California unless they are residents of the destination city or county, are being sent to family members who have agreed to care for them, or are being sent to a medical facility where arrangements have been made for their treatment.
Mary Woods, spokeswoman for the Nevada Department of Health and Human Services, said Tuesday afternoon that her agency would have no immediate comment on the suit.
The action follows a formal demand Herrera issued last month to Nevada officials. He said he planned to take legal action within weeks unless the state reimbursed San Francisco $500,000 for care of patients he maintains were improperly bused to the city since 2008. Herrera said an investigation by his office had identified 24 patients who had been bused to San Francisco over the past five years, 20 of whom Herrera said required emergency treatment upon arrival.
Nevada’s attorney general responded this week with a letter arguing that San Francisco had offered insufficient evidence to justify its claim. Records gathered by state health officials and given to Herrera “demonstrate that the policies are appropriate and that only proper discharges were made,” reads the letter, sent Monday and signed by Chief Deputy Attorney General Linda Anderson.
Nevada’s mental health system has been in the spotlight for months, following a Sacramento Bee report published earlier this year that found Rawson-Neal had bused 1,500 mentally ill patients out of Southern Nevada from July 2008 through early March 2013. About 500 were given one-way tickets to California.
The Bee undertook its investigation after one of those patients, James Flavy Coy Brown, turned up suicidal and confused at a Sacramento homeless services complex after a 15-hour bus ride from Las Vegas to the capital city. Brown said he knew no one in Sacramento and that Rawson-Neal doctors advised him to dial 911 once he arrived in the city.
Nevada health officials have acknowledged that they erred in shipping Brown to Sacramento without any arrangements for care. But they contend his case was an exception and that the vast majority of patients bused from Rawson-Neal had family or treatment waiting for them on the other end of their journeys.
They said many of the patients bused to their “home states” were vacationers who suffered breakdowns or abused drugs. A Herrera spokesman disputed that explanation.
“This is about Nevada’s state-sanctioned practice of improperly transporting indigent psychiatric patients,” said Matt Dorsey. “It’s not about patients who travel voluntarily between Nevada and other states.”
The lawsuit filed Tuesday charges that Nevada sent mentally ill people to California in a manner that placed patients, their fellow Greyhound passengers and residents of the places where they landed in peril.
“All of the patients were transported without escorts,” and often without “adequate food, water and medication” to sustain them during lengthy bus trips. Because the hospital failed to make proper arrangements for their care, many of the patients “ended up on the streets of their destination cities without funds or means of support, shelter or medication,” the suit reads.
Although Nevada is required by state law to care for its poor and indigent, it sent patients out of state “and avoided expending its own public resources” to provide for them, it says.
..."
reuters.com/article/2015/10/06/us-usa-patients-dumping-idUSKCN0S02M020151006
"Nevada has agreed to pay the city of San Francisco $400,000 to settle a lawsuit claiming that the state bused patients, many of them poor and mentally ill, from a Las Vegas hospital to the Bay Area without plans for their care, Governor Brian Sandoval's office said on Tuesday.
The settlement, which must still be approved by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and the Nevada Board of Examiners, includes attorneys' fees and a plan for better management and transfer of patients.
"We look forward to working with California to ensure all patient transfers to and from both states are managed using these best practices and adhering to conditions detailed in the agreement," Sandoval's office said in a statement.
The San Francisco City Attorney's Office declined to confirm the proposed settlement or comment on the matter on Tuesday.
The state-run Rawson-Neal Psychiatric Hospital in Las Vegas came under fire in April 2013 after the Sacramento Bee newspaper reported that hospital staff had given as many as 1,500 patients one-way bus tickets to California and 46 other states between 2008 and 2013.
San Francisco's City Attorney Dennis Herrera said the hospital had sent at least two dozen patients to the city via Greyhound bus, adding that shortly after their arrival most of the patients required medical care and shelter costing some $500,000 in city funds.
Herrera filed the suit against Nevada in September 2013 and said it could pave the way for other California jurisdictions to seek restitution from the state for damages similar to those San Francisco claimed.
Nevada health officials acknowledged the hospital had shipped some discharged patients out of state without documenting adequate aftercare plans for food, housing, medication and treatment. They said two employees were fired and three others faced disciplinary action."
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Comments
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
I cannot even fathom the sheer callousness displayed by the hospital employees to treat mentally ill people the way they did.
It's criminal negligence. The possibilities for harm (self and to others) are endless.
I get its a sarcastic rant but what about this quoted post in particular warranted this bullshit?
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
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