Life Care has said that as the crisis unfolded, managers initially had no reason to think that an outbreak of respiratory illness, common in nursing homes, was linked to the new
Even then, Life Care has said, administrators and medical staff were left largely on their own, with little help from government officials.
The facility earned five stars out of five on its federal ratings for overall care last year. However, as part of the same rating system, the government also gave the home three stars in the category of “health inspections,” which include recent routine inspections and those prompted by complaints.
The facility had 18 citations for health inspection issues, compared with an average of 20.4 for Washington State and the nationwide average of eight. Its high overall rating in spite of that could reflect the poor standards of nursing homes in general, nursing home experts said.
