Dementia care facilities in Delaware go uninspected


  • The state has failed to police these types of facilities in the past decade, even as high numbers of abuse, neglect and falls are reported to the Division of Health Care Quality.
  • State surveyors had not inspected many of these assisted living communities for years, according to hundreds of pages of inspection reports from 2013 to 2022.
  • The state has also weakened regulations and continued to underfund the division responsible for oversight.

The Rufo brothers received clear instructions from their father as he lay dying: Take care of your mother. When the time comes, find a nice facility for her − a place where she’ll be safe.

About a decade later in 2020, Maria Rufo no longer remembered how to turn off her gas stovetop. The Italian immigrant and family matriarch’s home, for years, had two fully equipped kitchens: One kept clean for company, the other in the basement where every Christmas Eve Maria cooked the Feast of the Seven Fishes. 

Sons Larry and Danny soon divided up morning and night shifts in order to care for Maria – changing, bathing and feeding her. They tried to do her hair like she did. 



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