In Greeneville, Tennessee, Lisa Taylor faced a difficult decision when her mother, Donna, needed care following an emergency room visit. On January 22, 2022, Donna, who suffers from Alzheimer’s disease, was admitted to a nursing home that also functioned as a rehabilitation center.

Despite her reservations, Taylor opted for the facility, believing it offered the best support for her mother’s needs. However, it wasn’t long before she suspected that Donna was experiencing neglect and mistreatment at the hands of the nursing staff.

“She was confined to bed because they failed to assist her at the necessary times, which was distressing,” Taylor explained. “The facility offered limited activities, prompting me to relocate her after some months.”

During one visit, Taylor discovered her mother in a distressing situation, face down while a nurse stood by, claiming to be measuring her blood pressure.

“A CNA initially checked my mom’s blood pressure upon arrival,” Taylor recounted. “The nurse mentioned it was low. Astonishingly, it took four hours for the nurse to return. By then, my mother’s blood pressure had plummeted to 77 over 32, and she was in the midst of a severe heart attack.”

“One of the CNAs checked mom’s blood pressure when she came in that day,” Taylor said. “The nurse said her blood pressure is low. It took that nurse four hours to come and check on my mom. When she did come back, my mother’s pressure was 77 over 32. She was in a full-blown heart attack.”

When Taylor asked for the incident to be investigated, she said she never heard anything back from management.

After another hospital stay, Donna was transferred to another care facility, which Taylor said she hoped would be better for her mother’s quality of life.

“This facility had activities for residents, but they had their picks of who they would invite to their activities,” she said. “There would be days that I would go over there, and mom would still be in bed, and I’d say ‘she needs to be up in her chair, and she needs to be in the dining room.’ The CNAs would tell me she wasn’t on the list to come to the activity today. It seemed that it was always someone else’s fault.”

Taylor said her mother frequently had unexplained bruising. When she questioned the staff about the marks, they would say it was because of Donna’s blood thinners.

Another time, Taylor claimed she was told her mother had fallen in the shower, to which no incident report was filed, nor had Taylor been notified.

“Once she had this huge bruise along her side by her arms,” Taylor said. “I asked the nurse on duty, ‘what happened to my mom?’ and [the nurse] said, ‘I’m not sure, it was probably the Hoyer lift.’ I’ve worked in healthcare for years, and I said a Hoyer lift doesn’t go under your arms.”

Taylor added that the facility neglected to give daily updates regarding her mother’s condition, even though she had previously voiced concerns with the staff.

“I was notified by staff, and they said, ‘I just wanted to let you know your mom’s been vomiting today, we had trouble with her oxygen,’” Taylor said. “I said it’s ten after three, why are you just calling me? He said ‘I wanted to let you know, I didn’t know what I needed to do.”

Donna entered the hospital again in Nov. 2024 after she contracted pneumonia.

“[The nurse] said when your mother was found, she was found lying on her back in her own vomit,” Taylor continued. “Why would you lie an individual down that’s been vomiting all day flat on their back? A CNA lied my mother down in bed like that, knowing she had been vomiting all day, and then my mother aspirated, and that’s one of the reasons my mother is not with me today.”

Donna passed away on Dec. 4, 2024, from aspiration pneumonia.

Taylor was still trying to file incident reports with both facilities, but she never heard back from them.

She later filed with the police and Adult Protective Services, who both recommended she file her incidents with the state in 2024.

Today, Taylor is still waiting for answers.

“[The state] should’ve responded when they were supposed to because people like my mom and several others might not be gone,” Taylor said. “I feel like if the state was doing their job, there wouldn’t have been so many lives taken.”

An audit revealed Tennessee had failed to investigate thousands of complaints filed against nursing homes and care facilities within the federal guidelines, some complaints taking more than five years to be settled.

“The quality of life of an individual doesn’t have to do with their diagnosis,” Taylor said. “I feel like once you go into a facility, you’re no longer human. You’re a number to them. If they cared, this stuff would be investigated. People would be reprimanded, terminated, whatever it took. [Nursing homes] are getting away with it. That’s why they continue to do it, and that’s why these individuals that live there do not live long.”

News Channel 11 reached out to Rep. John Crawford, who has previously spoken out on this issue, for comment and is waiting to hear back.