Good evening, all. I was in a situation last week where the meitah had been
very ill and in nursing care for many months. Members of our tahara team were
distraught at the state of bedsores in her diaper area, and struggled to
complete the tahara and dress her in tachrichim the best we could.
After
the event, I worried about the quality of care she had received, and whether I,
as a metaheret, had any responsibilities, legal or at least moral, to pursue
questions of the quality of care.
First, I am relieved to report that
after a long discussion with the funeral home, I learned that our meitah was
not, indeed, subject to neglectful care. An experienced and patient funeral
home professional was kind enough to spend time on the phone with me, and
explained that in the presence of many immune-compromising conditions (she
checked the meitah’s medical report and death certificate) and long-term
immobility, the skin conditions we observed in the tahara room were, alas,
within expectations.
The sadness with seeing someone with so many
physical woes is an issue I guess many of us experience. Beyond that, I began
to wonder about our responsibilities when there is identifiable neglect or even
abuse. I searched the net and learned that states have mandated reporting for
elder abuse for many professions, and undertakers (not volunteers, like us!) are
among those responsible.
For a tahara team, the issues
include
confidentiality and privacy concerns
authority, as most of us are
not trained medically to detect abuse
responsibility, as we are not
mandated reporters, so it’s not clear what situations demand a
response
and
halakhic concerns, as raising these concerns in the course of
a tahara risks nonhalakhic paths, such as photographs or delay of
burial
I wonder whether anyone in this google-groups has thought about
these concerns, or has been in a challenging situation where those issues arose,
or know of any pertinent written
materials.
Thanks,
Rachel
Rachel Braun
Silver Spring,
MD
https://www.TourofTorah.wordpress.comwww.zazzle.com/ArgamonEmbroidery