Lawsuit Claims Maimonides Plagued With Hazardous Conditionspublished online 07-28-2008 According to a New York Post exclusive, fire-safety violations are rampant at Brooklyn’s Maimonides Medical Center, as well as hazardous accumulations of sewage and mold, according to a wrongful-termination lawsuit filed by a former executive of the hospital.
According to the suit filed in Brooklyn Supreme Court, Patricia Abrams, the former assistant vice president for human resources at Maimonides, believes she was fired after making public the harmful and illegal conditions at the hospital.
Abrams claims she e-mailed hospital superiors with concerns about deficient fire safety knowledge, such as employees not knowing how to evacuate in the event of a fire, and dangerous conditions; in 2006, she headed an initiative to improve these hazardous conditions at the hospital, but faced vehement resistance.
Abrams told the New York Post, “I got the sense that they didn’t want anything to upset the apple cart. ‘Don’t rock the boat’ kind of a message.”
She also told the Post that official records of mandatory fire-watch patrols were often forged, and “the hospital shut down a sewage pump on weekends, causing a stench to descend on the Health Information Services Department, whose office had mold growing on the ceiling tiles.”
According to the Post, Abrams got an anonymous call in March 2007 telling her to “be careful” because she was “making enemies.”
“Maimonides does not comment on confidential personnel actions,” commented Joseph Leston, a hospital spokesman.
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