Pediatric Complex Care Program News Today

During a two-week trial, the Justice Department argued that Florida erected barriers for parents seeking to raise their children with complex medical needs at home and a federal judge appears to agree.

Attorneys representing Florida called the federal governments proposed changes smothering in civil rights case

The fate of 140 Florida children who are living their lives in institutions no longer rests with nursing home employees — or even state health administrators, who have fought for 12 years to keep them there. It now belongs to a federal judge who is presiding over a civil rights lawsuit filed by the U.S. Justice Department against state health regulators.

The fate of 140 Florida children who are living their lives in institutions no longer rests with nursing home employees — or even state health administrators, who have fought for 12 years to keep them there. It now belongs to a federal judge who is presiding over a civil rights lawsuit filed by the U.S. Justice Department against state health regulators.

A federal lawsuit asserts that Florida's reliance on institutions for medically fragile kids is an affront to laws requiring that people with disabilities be served in home-like settings when possible.

At the Plantation Nursing and Rehabilitation Center on Northwest Fifth Street, frail men and women with wheelchairs, walkers, and hearing aids live out their last years in an institutional setting. Nearby, but in a world of their own, medically fragile youngsters at the start of life’s journey spend day after day, year after year, confined to cribs.