The federal government has revoked the certification of the state's troubled mental hospital in Goldsboro after determining that the facility presented a danger to its patients.

The decision means that Cherry Hospital will lose federal insurance payments averaging about $800,000 each month, reports Lynn Bonner.

Cherry drew national attention after a patient was left sitting in a chair for more than 22 hours without food while staff members in the room played cards and watched television. Nursing staff members did not follow a doctor's orders to regularly check Steven Sabock's vital signs and give him fluids. At least two hospital workers were caught falsifying Sabock's medical records. Sabock, 50, died of a heart condition April 29.

After being warned that it was in danger of losing its money, Cherry started a staff re-education program on proper patient care to show investigators that it was trying to solve its problems. While those classes were under way, two staff members were accused of beating a patient.

Dempsey Benton, secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Services, argued in a letter to a federal administrator last week that Cherry should keep its federal insurance payments.

As part of its plan to improve Cherry, the state hired an Ohio management company to evaluate the hospital's operations and management.

The state is closing an adult admissions ward at Cherry Hospital, a state psychiatric hospital in Goldsboro, where a dying man was ignored by nursing staff.

In a statement today, the head of the state Department of Health and Human Services said the 16 staffers on duty at the time of the death have been removed from direct patient care duties and given other assignments for a period of at least 60 days, Lynn Bonner reports.

The employees will receive more training and re-education until the hospital director decides they are ready to resume caring for patients under the supervision of a training director, DHHS Secretary Dempsey Benton said.

Steven Sabock, 50, died at the mental hospital on April 29, after sitting in a chair for more than 22 hours without food or help using the bathroom. Hospital staff members were captured by security video playing cards and watching television in the room where Sabock sat.

"On behalf of the Department of Health and Human Services and myself personally, we deeply regret that Mr. Sabock died, and that it occurred while a patient at Cherry Hospital," Benton said. "The Department finds the circumstances related to this tragic death at Cherry Hospital completely unacceptable."

The closure reduces the admissions section from 90 beds to 67 in the three wards that will remain open. The total bed capacity of the hospital will drop from 274 to 251.