The IRE Resource Center is a major research library containing more than 23,250 investigative stories — both print and broadcast. These stories are searchable online or by contacting the Resource Center directly (573-882-3364 or rescntr@ire.org) where a researcher can help you pinpoint what you need. Browse or search the tipsheet section of our library below. Stories are not available for download but can be easily ordered by contacting the Resource Center:
Search results for "elder care" ...
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Cracking the Codes
Cracking the Codes documented how thousands of medical professionals have steadily billed Medicare for more complex and costly health care over the past decade – adding $11 billion or more to their fees – despite little evidence elderly patients required more treatment. The series also uncovered a broad range of costly billing errors and abuses that have plagued Medicare for years – from confusion over how to pick proper payment codes to apparent overcharges in medical offices and hospital emergency rooms. The findings strongly suggest these problems, known as “upcoding,” are worsening amid lax federal oversight and the government-sponsored switch from paper to electronic medical records.
Tags: Medicare; health care; billing; medical offices; hospitals; government; medical records
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Patient Safety Crisis at Parkland
This investigation takes a look at Parkland Memorial Hospital, which mostly treats Dallas' most vulnerable patients, the poor and the elderly. The findings are shocking and extensive, including patient neglect, unsupervised practices from doctors in training and poorly trained psychiatric technicians.
Tags: hospitals; psychiatric care; patient neglect
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Home or Nursing Home: America's Empty Promise to Give the Elderly and Disabled a Choice
"A new legal right gives the elderly and young people with disabilities in the Medicaid program the right to get their long-term health care at home, not in a nursing home. But the NPR investigation found that thise new right to choose one's care at home is largely denied to those who want it."
Tags: nursing home; elder care; disabled; long-term care; medical care; community-based care; Department of Health and Human Services; American with Disabilities Act; Olmstead Decision
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Compromised Care
Using confidential documents, computer datasets and gripping interviews, the reporters were able to expose widespread violence and abuse in the Illinois nursing homes and psychiatric hospitals that serve the poor.
Tags: Medicaid; elderly; abuse; psychiatric hospitals; sexual assault
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"Trust Betrayed"
In this investigative series, Sun Sentinel reporters find numerous employees of Florida day care centers and nursing homes have startling criminal backgrounds. Many of the employees had criminal records that revealed crimes of child abuse, rape and murder. An obviously flawed Florida state law allows people to begin working as caregivers before a background check is complete.
Tags: Background checks; Florida day care; Florida nursing homes; Charlie Crist; criminal background; Department of Children & Families; George Sheldon; Children, Families and Elder Affairs committee
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Compromised Care
Illinois is an outlier among states in its reliance on nursing homes to house younger adults with mental illness, including thousands of felons whose disabilities qualify them for Medicaid-funded nursing care. The reporters documented numerous recent cases in which elderly and disabled residents were assaulted, raped and even murdered in the facilities.
Tags: nursing home; mental illness; Medicaid; criminals; Illinois; police records; health department inspection data; complaint investigations; criminal records;
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Beaten Down: Fear and Violence in Canada's Nursing Homes; Off Limits
"Beaten Down" takes a look at how seniors are being poorly treated in nursing homes and that violence had increased significantly from 2003 to 2006. There were found to be increases in all types of violence: resident to resident, staff to resident, and resident to staff. In the "Off-Limits" series, prescription medication sales data for a 24-month period were examined after Health Canada warned doctors about prescribing medication that carried an increased risk of heart attack.
Tags: Long Term Care Medical Directors Association of Canada; Ontario; British Columbia; senior citizen; elderly; abuse; mistreatment; rest home;
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No Haven For the Elderly
This series "exposed significant patient-care deficiencies at one of Connecticut's largest nursing home operators, Haven Healthcare." Not only did the Courant's reporters discover neglect and a "deeply flawed regulatory system," the owner of the Haven Healthcare chain was using money to fund personal endeavors even while the chain fell into debt and could not pay for basic things.
Tags: Haven Healthcare; nursing home care; nursing home negligence
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Still Dying From Katrina
Two years after Hurricane Katrina, health care in New Orleans is still struggling to catch up with the needs of the community. Factors such as hospital closings, a lack of competent physicians and not enough funds are taking their toll on the citizens, especially the elderly. Katie Couric talked to many still homeless or destitute in the city and found one nurse who is saving as many New Orleans lives as she can.
Tags: Hurricane Katrina; Katrina recovery; health care; New Orleans; nurse; elderly;
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United HealthCare
United HealthCare "began an aggressive sales campaign targeting the most vulnerable population, the poor and elderly." Hidden cameras found the insurance agents being deceptive, often playing off of fear and sometimes even insulting the customer to make a sale.
Tags: HMO; health care; United HealthCare; elderly; poor; insurance agents; Missouri