Nursing Home Industry Wants to Reduce Lawsuits

If a business wants to reduce lawsuits, you would think the first thing they would do is reduce the risks that create lawsuits and make the world or their industry a better place.

Not so for the nursing home industry. Their first tactic is to ask residents to sign an agreement waiving their rights to sue and arbitrate disputes instead.

Why the change? Because the nursing home industry has been slammed with some astounding nursing home abuse lawsuit verdicts like $56 million for infected bedsores.

Arbitrators are less likely than juries to award punitive damages.

Is it fair to ask residents to sign such outlandish agreements? People in nursing homes have compromised minds and most likely are clueless to what they are signing. Families may be desperate to find a solution for their needy family members.

Two U.S. Senators introduced legislation to protect dispute resolution options for residents of nursing homes. The measure is in response to the increasing practice of nursing home facilities requiring patients to agree to arbitration as the sole vehicle for dispute resolution prior to admittance to a facility.

SOURCE: http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2008/04/11/nursing-homes-push-arbitration-reduce-lawsuits/?mod=WSJBlog

Nursing Home Negligence

There are many safe and fine nursing homes. It is unfortunate that some do not provide adequate care for elderly patients. Some examples of negligence that may occur in a nursing home include failure to appropriately monitor or restrain residents resulting in accidental injury, failure in the care of bedridden residents resulting in bed sores, failure to prevent infection, malnutrition and dehydration.

Recently the family of an elderly woman who died while in the care of an Illinois nursing home filed a suit against the facility. In this case, two employees were criminally charged with administering larger than normal does of morphine. The nursing home is charged with failing to adequately protect the patient.

The prospect that loved ones would not be cared for in a respectful manner by those entrusted is rightfully disturbing. Thorough research and scrutiny can provide a level of assurance. Medicare’s website offers an overviews of nursing homes and checklists to consider when searching for a quality residence for your loved ones.

Nursing Home Abuse in the Form of Malnutrition

When you place an elderly person in a nursing it is critical to protect the person from abuse. Of course, in order to protect the person from abuse you must look at all forms of abuse. For example, improperly feeding a member of the nursing home can be considered abuse if it leads to malnutrition. Sadly, a number of people could look at the nursing home occupant having dropped a great deal of weight due to lack of food as not being serious. This is a terrible mistake because there are a number of complications that can derive from malnutrition. As such, any aspect of nursing home abuse positively must be taken seriously.

Benign Neglect and Nursing Home Abuse

When people think of nursing home abuse they have a very narrow spectrum of what in entails. Nursing home abuse does always have to fall under the category of violent activity. Often, nursing home abuse is the result of benign neglect. That is to say, when someone is placed in a nursing home they are meant to be cared after. If they are not being looked after and harm befalls them (for example, the nursing home is not providing the tenant with their regular scheduled medication) the nursing has committed abuse by neglect. In such instances, the nursing home may be held liable for such gross neglect and deservedly so.

Avoiding Nursing Home Abuse
While there are actions people can take against a nursing home that is guilty of nursing home abuse in both civil and criminal courts it would be far better to simply avoid such a problem in the first place. The best way to do this would be to make sure that the nursing home is a quality establishment. Of course, in order to ascertain this it would be necessary to check references and perform a little online research on the nursing home. Yes, this may take some time but the end result will be well worth it as a truly disastrous situation could be completely avoided.