State fines Buffalo nursing home additional $10,000 for medication mistake

Nov. 1--A Buffalo nursing home has been hit with a second fine for the same 2018 incident involving "actual harm" to a resident who was mistakenly given insulin.

The state Health Department levied a $10,000 fine against Humboldt House Rehabilitation and Nursing Center. Earlier this year, the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services disclosed it fined the facility $47,827 after a female resident was incorrectly administered insulin injections.

According to a Health Department inspection report, the woman, who not identified, had ended up in the hospital after she was twice found unresponsive in her bed and had to be revived with medications and fruit juice.

State inspectors determined the woman had been given insulin shots despite a prior hospital discharge instruction to the nursing home staff that stated: "PLEASE AVOID GIVING THIS PATIENT INSULIN," in capital letters.

Humboldt House Administrator Isaac T. Williams repeated on Friday a prior statement noting that the resident eventually was successfully discharged from the facility to her home.

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