From Jim McDougal
To Marvin Zindler
Action13, KTRK-TV Houston, TX
Dear Marvin,
I’d like to thank you for all the good things you do as a consumer advocate and for the special way you are able to champion delicate situations needed by folks who just cant make the connections you have access to. I saw your Action13 report on nursing homes Monday evening and would like to comment on it.
First, I think it is very important for the public to know when these institutions are lax in their responsibilities or drop the ball when it comes to caring properly for their residents. I sincerely hope the situations encountered by your inspectors are fixed and that all nursing homes are inspired to clean up their respective acts.
I believe you do your viewers a disservice, however, when you only focus on the negative. Allow me to explain: in late January, my mother fell and broke her hip. While in the hospital, she was diagnosed with advanced Alzheimers and the medical and legal specialists would not consent to her returning home to live alone as she had done by choice for the past 17 years. She would have to be placed in a nursing home. This was a very difficult time for us (my sister, my wife and myself), as we had been taking up the slack where we could to enable mom to enjoy as much independence as possible.
