"N Wednesday, October 9, 1985/The Battalion/Page 9 Waldo by Kevin Thomas ; Healthcare 3 Sen. Gramm's budget reduction proposals ji attacked by supporters of aid for the poor '•iUniife, eiwtei leetmi i Jleges^j Jequaiel' •rtifiedrf e comfl ives )CAis lf that ind i p r ^; ;lt<)t-'" 'ogniw 11 /artlcg \ .dif* l SO] : i is 1 1 so il Associated Press AUSTIN — Texas organizations spending federal funds for health care said Tuesday that budget cuts pushed by U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm would undo the Texas Legislature’s recent move to improve health care for the poor. “Sen. Gramm’s hastily concocted scheme would effectively gut im proved health programs enacted by the Legislature last session,” said Mi chael Hudson, director of the the Children’s Defense fund. A Gramm spokesman in Washing ton said Hudson and those who joined him at a news conference “lack even a rudimentary under standing of the legislation.” “It’s clear from their comments that Mr. Hudson and others present would prefer to go on mortgaging the future of every child in Texas in order to lay their hands on some more of the taxpayers’ money to day,” said Larry Neal, Gramm’s press secretary. Jose Camacho, director of the Texas Association of Community Health Centers, said the Gramm proposal is “cost-shifting to the states.” “We either enact new state taxes to replace these federal funds or leave thousands of uninsured Texas mothers and babies without critical health care,” Camacho said. The Gramm-Rudman Amend ment, under debate in the U.S. Sen ate, would require Congress and the White House to abolish the $180 bil lion deficit by 1990. Across-the- board spending cuts would be im posed automatically if the president and Congress failed to meet annual budget targets. Hudson said under the Gramm amendment, T exas would lose $1.3 million the first year in funds for prenatal care and post-natal services. He said funds for prevention and treatment of veneral diseases, in cluding AIDS, would be “signifi cantly reduced.” Comacho said the 27 Texas com munity health centers would lose $2 million the first year, eliminating services to almost 3 1,000 people. Neal said “those figures are very obviously pulled out of thin air.” Consultant claims she saw nurse falsifying Autumn Hills records Associated Press SAN ANTONIO — A licensed vocational nurse, falsified records at an Autumn Hills n using home in Texas City in 1978, a nursing con sultant testified T uesday in the trial of a corporation and five people charged with murder by neglect. Pauline Kaper said she found pa tient charting at the nursing home was inadequate. “Did you notice any outright falsi fication of records?” Galveston County District Attorney Mike Gua- rino asked. Kaper testified: “I noted one. On a resident’s record there were some holes and gaps in charting and (a li censed vocational nurse) was filling in those holes. It was not even for a day she had worked.” Kaper’s testimony came in the trial of Autumn Hills Convalescent Centers Inc. and five of its current and former employees. The de fendants are accused in the Nov. 20, 1978, death of Elnora Breed. 87, who died 47 days.after she entered the Texas City home. The state has claimed the nursing home was guilty of wholesale neglect of its patients and of falsification of records. The defense claims Breed died of cancer. Kaper testified she was called in for a week in 1978 to act as a consul tant at the nursing home after a state health department inspection turned up several deficiencies. She said she told nursing home administrator Virginia Wilson thfit she saw a licensed vocational nurse falsifying records, but Wilson had no response. Wilson is one of the five individ ual defendants in the case. T he oth ers are Autumn Hills president Rob ert Gay; vice president Ron Pohlmeyer; nursing consultant Mat- tie Locke; and former director of nursing services Cassandra Canlas. Kaper said that after she in spected the nursing home and its re cords, she was particularly con cerned about Breed. She testified there was a strong urine odor to Breed and throughout the nursing home. “I’m not saying you won’t have an odor at a nursing home from time to time,” she said. “But if it’s there all the time, then you have a problem.” Kaper said she found catheters on a number of patients were not being changed often enough. Kaper said she also noted the pa tients were not being given enough water, were not being monitored on their food intake, were not being kept clean and were not being turned regularly. Egyptian troops to receive anti-terrorist training Associated Press WESLACO — A team of Egyptian security troops, trained to protect American dignitaries and to combat terrorists such as those who hijacked a luxury cruise ship, are in the Rio Grande Valley for a specialized training course. The 23 Egyptians will be trained for three weeks by Pat Dalager, a former director of the criminal justice training program at Texas A&M University. Dalager, a retired Army lieutenant colonel in the mil itary police, was selected by the U.S. State Department to instruct the course. Dalager said some of the Egyptian troops in T exas could have become involved in the current crisis in the Middle East, in which several Palestinian terrorists hi jacked the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro. The ship docked briefly in Egypt, but now is off the coast of Lebanon. The hijackers are asking Israeli officials to release 50 of their comrades held in their jails and reportedly have killed at least two Americans on the ship. “They would be (getting involved) if they were there, if it was in their jurisdiction,” said Dalager, the coordi nator of the Lower Rio Grande Valley Development Council’s Police Academy. But Dalager said most of the specialized training would be for the security forces that guard the U.S. Em bassy in Cairo and protect dignitaries. T he 150-hour, three-week course will include classroom, specialized and practical field exerices. Joining in the course, which began Monday, will be seven other police officers from South Texas, Dalager said. _ The training will include physical fitness exercises, weaponless defense tactics, entering and exiting vehi cles, instinct shooting techniques with AR-15s and 12- gauge shotguns, advanced driving techniques, bomb search techniques and cardiopulmonary resuscitation. There are about 14 different agencies across the country that train troops to guard dignataries abroad, but Dalager is the only one certified to do so in Texas. “I think it’s a feather in our cap, a testimonial to the capability of Mr. Dalager,” said Bob Chandler, exec utive director of the Lower Rio Grande Valley Devel opment Council. Dalager said the profits from teaching the course will go into providing reference and education materials for the police academy. “It’s very possible that with the situation as it is in Central and South America there could be more of these done in the Valley,” Chandler said. t inv , » apa^ l if