LONG BEACH, Calif. — A California woman has filed a complaint with state officials after she said her elderly mother, who has Alzheimer's disease, was dropped off by herself in the middle of the night outside a care facility after being discharged from a hospital.
Surveillance video obtained by The Long Beach Press-Telegram taken at about 2:15 a.m. Jan. 13 shows 84-year-old Savina Genoese Zerbi banging on the door of assisted living facility Regency Palms. She’s wearing only a bathrobe and slippers.
Over the next 25 minutes of footage, Zerbi can be seen intermittently wandering away from the front of the building and into a dark alley behind it before returning to knock on the door, the newspaper reported.
Zerbi had been taken Jan. 12 to the hospital, College Medical Center, for a psychological evaluation after she threatened suicide, Zerbi's daughter, Costanza Genoese Zerbi, told the newspaper. Officials with the hospital told Costanza Zerbi they'd ensure her mother was safely returned to Regency Palms, she said. But instead, they placed her mother in a taxi that dropped her off outside the facility.
"I was horrified," Costanza Zerbi told KTLA. "My mom has a hard time piecing together anything. She thinks something that happened yesterday happened 10 years ago; she thinks something that happened 10 years ago happened today."
It’s unknown how or when Savina Zerbi was let into Regency Palms.
Costanza Zerbi has filed a complaint against College Medical Center with the California Department of Public Health. She said she holds the hospital responsible for what happened to her mother.
College Medical Center officials haven’t responded to requests for comment.
The California Department of Public Health wouldn't comment on the specific case, but department officials said it "investigates all complaints or facility-reported incidents which may violate any state law or regulation within CDPH's authority to enforce."
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