Corporate Greed and Lies

Skilled nursing facility operator Ensign Group is quick to peddle its lies according to a new report. They boast of their so-called “industry-leading” clinical outcomes and mislead by claiming they have a “strong history of quickly improving the quality of care.”

The actual truth is far from the pleasant masquerade that glosses facility websites.

Cheryle Weir banged on the wall for help. She was a resident at an Ensign facility, and she was on a ventilator and could not breathe. Cheryle called for help the only way she could—by pounding her fist in a desperate plea for care. There was no nurse to hear her though.

Her family blamed her death on the Ensign Group in a lawsuit they filed against the company.

Ensign provides care to high-acuity patients, meaning patients who are the sickest. This may sound noble, but the reason Ensign cares for these patients in particular is so it can get the most money possible from government programs.

However, Ensign does not have the staff necessary to care for the people who need the most help. The higher-ups are aware of this situation, and they prefer it this way. By cutting hours that nurses and other employees work, the company rakes in incredible profit.

Hunterbrook Media, which reported on the dishonest practices that Ensign engages in, calculated a 5 million-hour gap between hours of nursing care needed and hours actually provided at Ensign facilities between July and November 2024.

“The difference between those two numbers is fraud,” said Ernest Tosh, an attorney who represents plaintiffs in nursing home abuse and neglect cases.

By cutting nursing hours, Ensign saved $161 million across all of its facilities.

It’s difficult to say how understaffed Ensign truly is, as the staffing numbers it provides are likely padded.

In addition, the “industry-leading” care Ensign is so proud of is based on self-assessments. When independent studies have been done, Ensign performs poorly.

Over and over again, Ensign plays the same dirty trick. It buys struggling nursing homes, reduces working hours in great numbers, and basks in the financial success of its $10 million empire.

While Ensign claims it improves care in newly acquired facilities, Hunterbrook found that the quality of the facilities gets worse, not better, after Ensign acquires them.

Several facilities have conditions that are so severe that they are on CMS’s “Special Focus Facility” list, a roundup of facilities with a pattern of serious problems that pose risks to resident health and safety. These facilities risk termination from Medicare or Medicaid programs.

Not only is all of this evil, but it is illegal as well. Ensign grabs up more and more taxpayer money as they fall below minimum standards established by law.

Federal law requires that every Medicare- and Medicaid-funded nursing facility keep “sufficient nursing staff” to meet each resident’s needs. Hours worked at Ensign, however, do not correlate with the high number of very sick patients they house.

There are also state laws Ensign breaks. Records from the Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services during 2020 through 2025 show that Ensign facilities fell below legal minimums in four states on more than 18,000 days cumulatively.

Former employees have described a pattern of intentional misrepresentations. Documents were falsified, phony Google reviews were published, and staff members were encouraged to fall in line.

One former Ensign therapist said that minutes of therapy were inflated to get higher billing: “The 30 would be erased and somebody would put in a 70.”

A practice called tunneling, in which money is shuffled between affiliated landlords, home office, transportation entities, etc., is also used by Ensign for fraudulent purposes. In 2024, Ensign paid $339 million to its connected businesses. “In effect it’s money laundering” Tosh said.

For the executives at the top, this profit system works out rather well. Ensign’s CEO received over $13 million in compensation in 2025. The CFO took home nearly $12 million, and more than $9 million went to the COO.

Behind all these numbers though, there are real people who suffer and fall victim to Ensign’s schemes.

Herbert Howenstein, died after a large pressure ulcer developed at an Ensign nursing home. The ulcer was a sight that would make one uneasy: six inches long, an inch deep, blackened dead flesh, penetrating to muscle. An EMT report shows that facility staff were aware but no one treated him for it.

Another resident with Alzheimer’s and who was nonverbal was found covered in ants with bites all over her body. The disturbing infestation was discovered by her family, not staff.

And of course, Cheryle Weir died begging for help that never arrived.

Charlene Harrington, a professor who studies the fraud and neglect that is rampant in the nursing home industry, wisely stated, “When you have a multibillion-dollar corporation, there’s no excuse for killing people.”