A former beautician at a York, Pennsylvania nursing home is suing the facility, claiming she was exposed to damaged asbestos tiles in the salon where she catered to elderly residents.

According to an article in the York Daily Record, Mary Ann Gruzs has filed suit against the Pleasant Acres Nursing and Rehabilitation Center, alleging unnecessary exposure to asbestos. Gruzs, who began working at the facility in 2001, says that the condition of the salon’s floor tiles had deteriorated greatly by 2005 and that she made several requests for the broken, brittle tiles to be replaced. A maintenance worker at the home told her the tiles contained asbestos.

When the tiles were finally replaced, Gruzs complains, it was done with no regard to the health and safety of staff and residents, and those removing the tiles were not licensed to work with asbestos, Gruzs adds.

Gruzs asked for an air quality test after the floor was removed, but nursing home officials refused, claiming that the air was fine. Instead, Gruzs took some of the discarded tiles to a laboratory for testing, where the tiles were determined to contain hazardous levels of asbestos.

Union officials, says Gruzs, would not accept her complaint. Next, notes the article, “she participated in a conference call with the union and a representative of the state Department of Environmental Protection on June 5, 2006, and then again filed a grievance with the union based on her belief that the tiles contained dangerous levels of asbestos-containing materials and the tiles were not properly removed and disposed of, possibly exposing residents, coworkers, and Gruzs to dangerous levels of airborne asbestos particulates.”

She was then told that the grievance would be heard but instead, when she arrived at the meeting, she was fired. The nursing home claims she was absent without notice and that that was the reason for her termination.

Gruzs is asking for compensatory damages in excess of $350,000 with interest and costs and reasonable attorney fees.

This entry was posted on Monday, November 12th, 2007 at 3:49 pm and is filed under Asbestos Exposure. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS feed. Responses are currently closed, but you trackback from your own site.