Husband seeks to hold Turlock nursing home accountable after wife dies of COVID-19

A Mariposa County man wants answers from a Turlock nursing home after his wife died of COVID-19 complications Wednesday night, three weeks after she left the facility.

The death reinforced Jack Wilmeth’s calls for accountability from Turlock Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, which is tied to an outbreak of more than 130 coronavirus cases and 16 deaths as of Thursday.

Wilmeth has been questioning the center’s responsibilities amid the outbreak ever since April 21, when a staff member notified him an employee tested positive for COVID-19. Wilmeth’s 78-year-old wife, Janet, had been discharged home the day before, so he asked if staff could arrange testing for her. Three days later, staff called to say they would not test her because she was no longer a patient.

“They pretty much just blew me off on that Friday,” Wilmeth said. “I think those exact words (they said) were ‘not our problem.’ ”

But the 75-year-old wondered why staff discharged her in the first place, saying he couldn’t tell if Janet’s health improved compared to March 28, when she entered the nursing home for rehabilitation after fighting a kidney infection and influenza A. Janet was so weak the day she was discharged, Wilmeth said, he needed to use a medical lift to bring her into the house.

The last time his wife left the Turlock facility after treatment for severe infections, Wilmeth said she made progress at home. This time, about a year later, she did not.

Couple tests positive for COVID-19

His wife’s health worsened, Wilmeth said, and he began feeling sick, too. Their primary care doctor advised Wilmeth to get his wife tested, but Wilmeth said he couldn’t move her in and out of the car. His ability to care for Janet kept decreasing and by April 29, nine days after the discharge, the home health and physical therapist team couldn’t improve her condition, either.

“At that point, I couldn’t do anything,” Wilmeth said. “I couldn’t even turn her over at that point. I couldn’t clean her up or anything and I called the (911) medics.”

Janet Wilmeth tested positive for COVID-19 shortly after arriving at Emanuel Medical Center in Turlock that day, and a test at the Salida testing site revealed Jack Wilmeth had contracted it, too. While doctors told Jack he could recover at home, doctors put Janet in end-of-life comfort care. She died peacefully in hospice Wednesday night, Wilmeth said, two weeks after going to the hospital.

Wilmeth suspects that his wife contracted COVID-19 while at Turlock Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, then passed it along to him at their home. Because of his age and asthma, Wilmeth quarantined himself during the three weeks she stayed at the nursing home, so he doubts he caught it elsewhere.

Covenant Care, the facility’s parent company based in Aliso Viejo, did not respond to messages requesting comment on Janet Wilmeth’s care. When reached by phone, the Turlock facility directed The Bee to Covenant Care.

Coronavirus outbreak raises legal questions

On Thursday, Wilmeth told The Bee he plans to discuss legal options with county public health. If she hadn’t caught the coronavirus, he believes his wife of 19 years would still be alive and wouldn’t have been the 15th former or current Turlock Nursing and Rehabilitation Center resident to die.

The Mariposa resident, who finished his 14-day isolation period Wednesday, said he saw workers at the center not wearing personal protective equipment the day of his wife’s discharge. The family of a Newman grandmother has similarly questioned the safety precautions management took before the coronavirus outbreak developed.

Wilmeth also previously told The Bee he thought the center was morally obligated to provide a COVID-19 test to his wife. Legally, skilled nursing facilities are not required to test previous residents, said Deborah Pacyna, director of public affairs for the California Association of Health Facilities.

“Nursing homes have no legal right or license to treat persons not in their care,” Pacyna said in an email. “Most patients are discharged to home health and it would be up to the primary care physician or home health physician to refer the patients for testing should there be a concern. Previously, all testing was managed by local health departments and nursing homes had no say as to who was going to be tested including staff, current residents, potential residents or previous residents. Even now facilities have access issues to testing.”

On the state level, the association has joined other health care industry groups in requesting Gov. Gavin Newsom grant nursing homes and hospitals immunity from lawsuits related to the coronavirus. Newsom has yet to announce a decision on the matter.

This story was originally published May 14, 2020 at 1:57 PM.