Nurse's Aide Sentenced in Laxatives Case

A former nurse's aide was sentenced to 10 months in prison Monday for conspiring with another nurse to give nursing home patients laxatives to make them sick. Susan Mejak, 39, conspired with co-worker Kim Koah, a former nurse, to give five patients milk of magnesia, which caused them severe diarrhea and dehydration, according to court records. The idea was to get back at a nurse on the next shift with whom Koah had a disagreement. The nurses on that shift had to deal with the after-effects of the laxatives. "I'm ashamed and embarrassed," Mejak said. "I didn't try to talk her out of it. I was scared and didn't know what to do. She was my friend and my supervisor. I was stuck between a rock and a hard place." Mejak pleaded no contest to five counts of patient abuse last month in Medina County Common Pleas Court. Koah is serving a 10-month sentence on the same charges. Both worked at Willowood Care Center in Brunswick, about 18 miles south of Cleveland.