Mountain Laurel Healthcare: Feeding Tube Care Failures - PA
The violation, recorded under a regulatory category covering quality of life and care, goes to something fundamental about how a nursing home treats its most vulnerable residents. Feeding tubes are not routine equipment. They are inserted into a person's body, they carry infection risk, they require consistent monitoring, and their use is supposed to reflect both a clear medical need and the resident's own agreement. When that process breaks down, the consequences can be serious.
Inspectors classified the deficiency as an isolated problem, meaning they did not find it affecting residents throughout the facility. But they did find potential for more than minimal harm. That phrase carries weight in federal inspection language. It means inspectors looked at what was happening and concluded that someone could get hurt.
The inspection was conducted on August 14, 2025, and logged as a complaint survey, meaning someone had raised concerns before inspectors walked through the door.
Mountain Laurel Healthcare and Rehabilitation Center sits in Clearfield, a small city in central Pennsylvania. It is a long-term care and rehabilitation facility, the kind of place where residents may arrive after a hospital stay and either recover and go home or settle in for the remainder of their lives. For residents who cannot eat or swallow safely on their own, a feeding tube can be the difference between adequate nutrition and a slow physical decline. That dependency is exactly why the rules around feeding tube use and care exist.
The specific deficiency cited, tagged F0693 in federal inspection records, covers two distinct obligations. First, a facility must not use a feeding tube unless there is a documented medical reason and the resident, or the resident's representative, has agreed to it. Second, for any resident who already has a feeding tube, the facility must provide appropriate ongoing care. The citation does not specify which of those obligations went unmet, or how many residents were affected. What the inspection record establishes is that something in that process failed.
Fourteen deficiencies in a single inspection is not a minor showing. The feeding tube violation was one piece of a larger picture that inspectors documented across multiple areas of care. The full scope of what they found extends beyond what this single citation describes.
The facility reported a correction date of September 25, 2025, roughly six weeks after the inspection. Whether that correction involved updated care plans, staff retraining, a review of which residents had feeding tubes and whether their consent had been properly documented, or some combination of those steps, the inspection record does not say.
What it does say is that on the day inspectors arrived, the standard of care for at least one resident with a feeding tube was not being met.
Feeding tube complications are not abstract risks. Tubes can become dislodged. Insertion sites can become infected. Residents who are not properly monitored can aspirate, meaning stomach contents can enter the lungs, which can cause pneumonia. Residents who were never fully informed about what a feeding tube involves, or who never meaningfully agreed to one, may find themselves tethered to a device they did not choose. The requirement that facilities obtain agreement before placing a feeding tube exists because residents in nursing homes retain the right to make decisions about their own bodies, even when they are frail, even when they are dependent on staff for every basic need.
A facility that cannot reliably document that right was honored, or that cannot reliably provide the care a feeding tube requires once it is in place, has failed at something close to the center of what nursing home care is supposed to be.
Mountain Laurel's correction date has passed. According to the inspection record, the facility identified what went wrong and reported fixing it. But the resident or residents whose care prompted the citation spent time in a facility that was not meeting the standard. That time does not get corrected.
Full Inspection Report
The details above represent a summary of key findings. View the complete inspection report for Mountain Laurel Healthcare and Rehabilitation Ctr from 2025-08-14 including all violations, facility responses, and corrective action plans.
Additional Resources
Data source: This article is based on inspection data downloaded directly from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) via Medicare.gov. CMS releases inspection reports in bulk; we publish the findings as documented by state surveyors in the official Form CMS-2567 Statement of Deficiencies.
Plan of correction: The CMS report we receive does not include the facility's plan of correction. Facilities submit plans of correction separately to state survey agencies and those responses may not be reflected in CMS data at the time of publication. The absence of a plan of correction in our data does not mean one was not filed. Readers who want information about corrective steps taken are encouraged to contact the facility directly or their state survey agency.
Corrections may have occurred: Inspection reports reflect conditions observed on the date of the survey. Facilities may have implemented corrections, staffing changes, additional training, or other remediation since the report was issued. We report what CMS provides and encourage readers to seek current information from the facility.
Editorial process: Inspection findings are extracted from CMS source documents and synthesized using AI, reviewed for factual accuracy against the original report by our editorial team.
Corrections: We strive for accuracy in everything we publish. If you believe any fact in this article is incorrect, please contact us with details, and we will review and correct it promptly.
Professional review: All content reviewed by Christopher F. Nesbitt, Sr., NH EMT & BU-trained Paralegal.
Last verified: October 19, 2026 · Our methodology
MOUNTAIN LAUREL HEALTHCARE AND REHABILITATION CTR in CLEARFIELD, PA was cited for violations during a health inspection on August 14, 2025.
Feeding tubes are not routine equipment.
Health inspections identify deficiencies that facilities must correct. Violations range from minor documentation issues to serious safety concerns. Review the full report below for specific details and facility response.