57BloombergBusinessweek November 9, 2020Nursing homes responded to the
pandemic by blame-shifting,
but an investigation into a troubled
chain suggests the industry could
have done more to stop outbreaks
By Ben Elgin
Photographs by Tamara Reynolds
In early April the Trevecca Center for
Rehabilitation & Healing in Nashville
received an urgent call. At the time,
Tennessee had only 3,000 corona
virus cases, compared with more than
100,000 in the state of New York. But the
caller, the nursing director at a nearby
kidney dialysis center, was worried.
She said one of the home’s residents
had been given a routine test before an
appointmentandhadtestedpositivefor
thecoronavirus.Shesaidshebelieved
thatTrevecca,a 240bed nursing home,
might have an outbreak on its hands.
Trevecca’s managers were busy, she was
told, so she left a message.
Two days later, the caller tried again,
insisting that this was serious and asking
to speak with the home’s administrator,
Carl Young. But she didn’t get through
to Young—nor did people from a second
dialysis center with an identical warning,
say four current and former Trevecca
employees familiar with the calls.
The dialysis workers weren’t the
only ones worried that something was
wrong at the facility. Nashville’s Metro
Public Health Department had also got
ten a report from a Trevecca contractor
who was helping oversee its ventilator
unit. The contractor said a Trevecca
manager had warned him that sick res
idents weren’t being tested for Covid.
“This just does not seem right clinically
or ethically,” wrote the contractor in an
email, which was first reported by the
city’s NewsChannel 5.
Metro health officials spent several
days trying unsuccessfully to reach
Young.OnSaturday,April4,Michael
Caldwell,thedepartment’s director,
drovetoTrevecca’sfivestory facility and
left his card, imploring Young to get back
to him immediately. That evening, Young
finally did call, assuring Caldwell that
everything was under control, according
to health department officials. He said
no residents were showing symptoms
of the virus, and there was no need for
tests. (Young didn’t respond to requests
for comment.)
It would be another 18 days before
health officials came in to test all of
Trevecca’s patients and many of its work
ers. By the time that finally happened,Employees say Nashville’s Trevecca Center left staff
and residents, like Anna Ruth McGill, vulnerable to Covid