The Ohio Department of Developmental Disabilities (“department”) maintains an Abuser Registry (“registry”), which is a list of employees who the department has determined have committed one of the registry offenses listed below. The developmental disabilities (DD) employees that may be placed on the registry include: department employees, county board of developmental disabilities employees, independent providers under Ohio Revised Code (R.C.) section 5123.16, an employee providing specialized services to an individual with a developmental disability, including an entity licensed or certified by the department.

If your name is placed on the registry you are barred from employment as a DD employee in the state of Ohio.

Since other state agencies require employers to check the registry, placement may also prohibit:

(1) being employed by a Medicaid agency, being an owner (five percent or more) of an agency or having a Medicaid Provider Agreement as a non-agency provider;

(2) being in a position to provide Ombudsman services or direct care services to anyone enrolled in a program administered by the Ohio Department of Aging; and

(3) being employed by a home health agency, a nursing home, or residential care facility in a direct care position.

Registry Offenses:

• Physical Abuse - the use of any physical force that could reasonably be expected to result in physical harm.
• Sexual Abuse - unlawful sexual conduct (unprivileged intercourse or other sexual penetration) and unlawful sexual contact (unprivileged touching of another’s erogenous zone).
• Verbal Abuse - purposely using words to threaten, coerce, intimidate, harass, or humiliate an individual.
• Prohibited Sexual Relations- Consensual touching of an erogenous zone for sexual gratification and the individual is in the employee’s care and the individual is not the employee’s spouse.
• Neglect - when there is a duty to do so, failing to provide an individual with any treatment, care, goods, or services necessary to maintain the health or safety of the individual.
• Misappropriation (Theft) - obtaining the property of an individual or individuals, without consent, with a combined value of at least $100. Theft of the individual’s prescribed medication, check, credit card, ATM card and the like of any monetary value are also registry offenses.
• Failure to Report Abuse, Neglect, or Misappropriation - the employee unreasonably does not report abuse, neglect, or misappropriation of the property of a person with developmental disabilities, or the substantial risk to such an individual of abuse, neglect, or misappropriation, when the employee should know that their non-reporting will result in a substantial risk of harm to such individual.