Dog Attack Fatalities in 2010

Dog attacks can result in devastating consequences. If your child has been injured or killed in a dog bite incident, a Chicago dog bite attorney from the Law Offices of Barry G. Doyle, P.C. can help you file your personal injury or wrongful death claim. Contact us today for a free case evaluation – 312-263-1080.

Alzheimer’s Patients at Risk of Being Abused

Nursing home abuse is a real issue and Alzheimer’s patients are at greater risk of being abused. A Chicago nursing home abuse lawyer at the Law Offices of Barry G. Doyle, P.C. can help you document and investigate your nursing home abuse claim. Contact us today for a free case evaluation – 312-263-1080

Facts and Statistics on Nursing Home Abuse

Here are some startling facts and statistics on nursing home abuse. A Chicago nursing home abuse lawyer at the Law Offices of Barry G. Doyle, P.C. can help you document and investigate your nursing home abuse claim. Contact us today for a free case evaluation – 312-263-1080

What Is My Illinois Nursing Home Abuse Claim Worth?

There is no set formula to estimate the value of a nursing home abuse claim. If your loved one has been abused in a nursing home, a Chicago personal injury attorney from the Law Offices of Barry G. Doyle, P.C. can help you file your Illinois nursing home abuse claim. Contact us today for a free case evaluation – 312-263-1080.

How Long Will My Illinois Nursing Home Abuse Lawsuit Take?

A nursing home abuse lawsuit in Illinois can be a long and exhausting battle. If your loved one has been abused in a nursing home, a Chicago nursing home abuse attorney from the Law Offices of Barry G. Doyle, P.C. can help you file your personal injury claim. Contact us today for a free case evaluation – 312-263-1080.

Various Types of Nursing Home Abuse

Sometimes nursing homes fail to meet the standards that are required of them. If you or a loved one has been abused in a nursing home, a Chicago personal injury attorney from the Law Offices of Barry G. Doyle, P.C. can help you file your personal injury claim. Contact us today for a free case evaluation – 312-263-1080.

My Loved One Is In A Nursing Home. How Do I Know If They Are Being Abused?

If your loved one is in a nursing home, then there may be signs or indications that they are suffering from abuse. If you or a loved one has been abused in a nursing home, a Chicago personal injury attorney from the Law Offices of Barry G. Doyle, P.C. can help you file your personal injury claim. Contact us today for a free case evaluation – 312-263-1080.

Manor Court in Clinton cited by IDPH

Manor Court nursing home in Clinton was cited by the Illinois Department of Public Health for several patient care deficiencies, including inadequate hot water, failing to treat pressure sores, falls, medication errors, and inadequate staffing levels at the nursing home.  The citation by the Department resulted in a fine of $400 per day and the removal of the administrator.

While the citation treats inadequate staffing levels as a separate violation from the other patient care violations, the reality is that inadequate staffing was probably the cause of the other patient care issues.  Federal regulations require nursing homes to have properly trained staff on hand in adequate numbers to meet the care needs of the residents on a 24-7 basis.

Where there are chronic patient care issues such as bed sores, significant numbers of medication errors, and recurrent falls, that is a sign that the nursing home probably does not have adequate staffing to truly meet the care needs of the residents.  The lack of adequate staffing will always go back to the decisions of the ownership of the nursing home to put profits ahead of the well-being of the nursing home residents whose care was entrusted to them.

Interview in Chicago Senior News

I was interviewed in an article which appeared in April, 2010 issue of the Chicago Senior News on the topic of resident-on-resident assaults and nursing home safety.

Wandering nursing home resident killed by train

A 71 year old resident of a Missouri nursing home was killed last week when she left the facility and wandered onto a nearby set of railroad tracks where she was killed by a train.

One of the main causes of people admitting family members to nursing homes is that with the onset of dementia, they leave the home and put themselves at risk by wandering into unsafe areas.  When the family comes to recognize that this is a problem which they cannot monitor on the 24/7 basis called for, this is what prompts the decision to admit their parent to a nursing home.

On admission, the nursing home is required to perform an assessment on the resident's condition and where the resident is determined to be at risk for "elopement" -- the technical term for wandering, then a care plan must be put into place to address the risk of elopement.  The usual course of action is to place a sensor on their clothing or person which sets off an alarm when they leave the facility and/or placing them on a secure floor where they are not free to leave.  Simply tying them or restraining them is not an acceptable alternative because this has its own risks.

Wandering or elopement in a nursing home is a serious safety risk to the health and well-being of a nursing home resident.  There have been instance where nursing home residents have wandered into traffic, have fallen into bodies of water and drowned, been the victim of violent crimes, or have frozen to death during winter months.  Nursing homes know that wandering is a real danger and must develop and implement a care plan to prevent wandering.

This wrongful death will no doubt be investigated by state authorities, and I would be willing to bet that at least one of these things will turn up:  that the resident was not wearing a sensor; that the alarms were either shut off or malfunctioning; or that the alarms did sound but no one responded because they were short-handed.

Somerset Place closes, many residents transferring to other facilities

Last week, following the loss of state funding, Somerset Place in Chicago's Uptown neighborhood closed its doors.  The nursing home had been the subject of a number of Chicago Tribune articles which detailed the many problems the troubled nursing home had providing quality care to its residents, including many resident-on-resident assaults and other nursing home care deficiencies.

The nursing home served exclusively the mentally ill, and some of the residents are being transferred from the nursing home to group homes and other structured environments.  However, many of the other residents are being transferred to other area nursing homes.

The bulk transfer of many residents from a troubled nursing home does not bode well for the facilities accepting transfers from Somerset Place.  There are a number of reasons for this:

1.  The residents will be arriving all at the same time.  That means that the resources of the accepting facilities will be stretched beyond capacity as they try to assess the new arrivals and integrate them into the new facility.

2.  The residents coming from Somerset are coming from a facility where unacceptable behavior toward one another and the staff was fairly routine.  It will certainly take time for these residents to unlearn those behaviors and how to conduct themselves in an appropriate manner toward staff and residents in their new homes.

3.  The staff at the new nursing home will not know each of the residents they are now assuming care for.  There is a certain amount of institutional memory that helps with nursing home care which allows nurses to know when someone is not at the usual baseline condition.  All of that memory is lost with the closing of the facility.

4.  When residents are transferred to a new facility, they are at increased risk of accidents due to disorientation and confusion and simply not being familiar with the new nursing home. 

Somerset Place was a nursing home that badly needed to be closed.  It was a perfect example of what is wrong with much of how nursing home care is provided in Illinois today.  However, suddenly closing the doors and sending residents en masse elsewhere is not the smart or safe way to transfer the Somerset residents.

Problem of sex offenders in nursing homes not unique to Illinois

In light of the many recent newspaper articles about the widespread resident-on-resident assaults in nursing homes in Illinois, I was interested to see that there was a similar kind of story being reported about a nursing home in Pennsylvania.  There a wheelchair-bound convicted sex offender residing in a nursing home was found putting his hands under the clothing of a mentally disabled resident. 

The quote in the article which I found telling came from Wes Bledsoe, the president of A Perfect Cause, a nursing home advocacy group:

 

“Most of the cases we’ve seen, it’s about the money,” said Bledsoe. “To have another person in another bed for a year can be a significant financial advantage to them.”

In short, nursing homes are accepting residents into the facility who pose a safety hazard to their fellow residents because they will fill a bed, sometime for long periods of time, often on public dollars.  In short, the nursing home operators are choosing profits over people.  It also looks like Illinois nursing homes are not the only ones making that choice.

Meidcation error results in nursing home resident's death

A Minnesota nursing home has been cited by the State after a resident died following a medication error in  the nursing home.  Two other residents had to be hospitalized due to medication errors that occurred between May 27, 2009 and June 12, 2009.  Overall, the inspection showed that the nursing home had an overall medication error rate of 18%.

Medication errors are a major cause of injury to nursing home residents.  This is especially true since many take several medications, increasing the chances of an adverse drug interaction due to a medication error.

Nurses are responsible for dispensing medications at the nursing and are required to make 5 checks before giving medication: 1) Right patient, 2) Right medication, 3) Right dose, 4) Right time, and 5) Right method.

These checks are in place specifically to prevent medication errors.  When the error rate is 18% (nearly 1 in 5!), there are clearly systemic issues at this facility either in terms of procedures or training.  However, an error rate that high is totally unacceptable and is likely to result in death or harm to other nursing home residents.

Nursing home resident suffers facial fractures in fall

A former resident of a California nursing home has filed nursing home abuse and neglect suit against the facility for injuries she sustained in a nursing home fall.   She had been living at home with the assistance of her grandson, but when he had to travel out of town for medical testing for himself, she was admitted to a nursing home for a short-term stay.

At the time of the admission, the grandson was careful to let the nursing home know that his grandmother was a fall risk and that she needed extensive assistance with walking and getting up and down from a seated position.  A care plan was put into place for a two-person assist when getting onto and off the toilet.

Unfortunately, one CNA tried to assist her from the toilet by herself and lost control of the resident, causing her to fall forward and hit her face on the floor where she sustained multiple facial fractures.  She had to be hospitalized and is now a long-term resident of another nursing home.

Nursing home fall suits are often very different from traditional slip and fall suits.  In a normal slip and fall suit, there must be an object or substance that causes the fall or a defect in the property that causes the fall.  There are some nursing home fall suits that focus on the resident tripping or slipping on a  substance or object, but many nursing home fall suits are not prosecuted on this theory.

The key issue in most nursing home fall suits is the development and implementation of a fall prevention care plan.  When a resident is admitted to a nursing home, the staff must assess the extent to which the resident is a fall risk and develop a care plan for preventing falls in the nursing home.  The staff then must implement the care plan.  They also must assess the effectiveness of the fall prevention care plan and if it is not effective, revise it.

As an experienced Chicago nursing home lawyer, there are four basic areas I consider in every nursing home fall suit we prosecute:

• Failure to properly assess the fall risk;
• Failure to develop an adequate fall prevention care plan;
• Failure to implement the care plan; and
• Failure to assess and revise the care plan.

In this particular case, the focus of the case will be on the implementation of the fall prevention care plan.  The care plan called for two people to assist her from the toilet, but only one person did so.  This was a violation of the care plan, and led to the resident's fall and fractures.

Nursing home suit filed over amputation

Follow-up care to a nursing home injury is crucial to ensure the health, safety, and well-being of nursing home residents. Failing to care for a nursing home resident after a fall or other injury can be the basis of an Illinois nursing home abuse and neglect suit, as happened in this Cook County suit against a nursing home.

Quality of care problems persist in for-profit nursing homes

Nursing homes are one of the few for-profit sectors in the health care industry, but large numbers of homes operated on a for-profit basis get poor quality of care ratings from the federal government.

Illinois nursing homes and liability insurance

I recently saw an editorial in a Mississippi newspaper about the current battle in the legislature there to require nursing homes to carry a minimum of $500,000 in liability insurance for nursing home abuse and neglect cases.   As you might expect, the nursing home industry is fighting that legislation tooth and nail.

The reason for the $500,000 figure in the legislation?  There is a $500,000 cap on noneconomic damages in Mississippi, and many nursing home residents have do not have significant medical expenses (because so few survive the poor care they receive) and almost none have any loss of earnings claims.  In light of this, the figure seems to be a pretty reasonable one -- one that requires them to be able to make good on any damage award that the courts hold them accountable for.

I guess that accountability is a little too much to ask for when it gets in the way of making money.

That story got me to thinking about one thing that surprises -- no, shocks -- many people about nursing homes in Illinois: they are not required to carry any liability insurance at all.

Over the course of my career, I have handled several cases against nursing homes that carried no insurance or carried inadequate insurance.  Insurance policies sometimes have adjustable limits that are reduced by defense costs.  Identifying the nursing home's insurance situation is one thing that we do early in the case and to some extent, it shapes our prosecuting strategy as well as the recommendations we make to the client.

Illinois Home Task Force issues final report

The state task force empaneled to help address nursing home safety issues issued its final report with recommendation which should help curb violence on nursing home residents.

Nursing home under investigation for overmedicating residents

Overmedicating nursing home residents with unnecessary pain medications in order to sedate them has serious safety implications for the well-being of nursing home residents and is a form of nursing home abuse and neglect.

Camelot Terrace in Streator issued citation

Camelot Terrace Nursing Home in Streator received an immediate jeopardy citation from the Illinois Department of Public Health last week.  The basis of the citation was a leaking roof and evidence of damage by termites to the facility.  The nursing home owner, Michael Lerner, was disputing the citation.

Mr. Lerner is the operator of other nursing homes in Illinois which have been the subjects of scrutiny.  He also operates Regal Rehab in Oak Lawn which was supposed to have been shut down last spring, but remains open.  He also operates Galesburg Terrace.  His management practices prompted the SEIU to launch a web site, www.lernernogem.org, a reference to GEM Health care, the umbrella organization for the Lerner-owned nursing homes.

The poor conditions at the Camelot facility have potential to cause harm to the residents.  This would have been the basis for the immediate jeopardy citation issued by IDPH.  I have represented the families of other residents to investigate nursing home neglect claims against Mr. Lerner's facilities, including issues with pressure ulcers, and have been troubled by the poor care received by the residents.  I was also surprised to learn that he does not carry liability insurance on the Regal Rehab nursing home, and suspect that this is his standard practice at all of his facilities.

Hopefully, this citation is a sign that the IDPH is taking a closer look at Mr. Lerner's facilities.

False charting at nursing homes

Evidence of false charting can be compelling evidence of substandard care in a nursing home abuse and neglect case. This is something that we look for carefully in every nursing home suit we handle.

Study indicates antipsychotic use increases incidence of hip fracture

The Journal of the American Medical Directors Association recently published a study on the incidence of hip fractures among older adults afflicted with dementia and using anti-psychotic medications.  The study reports that there is a higher incidence of hip fractures among this patient population.

The study reviewed data from the Minimum Data Sets (MDS's) from nursing homes.  This is a form which nursing homes use to report data to the federal government.  This means that the entire study population was nursing home residents.

The takeaway from this:  anti-psychotic usage is linked to a higher rate of hip fractures, likely due to falls by nursing home patients.  This means that anti-psychotic usage should be taken into account in doing fall risk assessments of nursing home residents and developing fall prevention care plans.  It also means that the use of anti-psychotics to address issues associated with dementia should be given careful consideration before proceeding with that kind of drug therapy.

State plan for caring for mentally ill in nursing homes under scrutiny

In the wake of a series of Chicago Tribune articles on Illinois nursing homes, in particular the problems caused by placing the mentally ill in nursing homes, the Belleville News-Democrat came out with a perceptive article on the basic problem with how Illinois treats its mentally ill.  It is worth reading.

Rather than place them in facilities which are dedicated to the treatment and therapy of the mentally ill, Illinois relies on placing them in private, for-profit nursing homes.  There, they place enormous demands on the nursing home staff which is in turn left with insufficient time and resources to meet the care needs of traditional, geriatric nursing home residents.  Sadly, the mentally ill residents are often the perpetrators of resident-on-resident assaults on fellow nursing home residents, many times on geriatric residents who are unable to defend themselves and are at risk of serious injury when assaulted.

It seems that some in our state's public health community are coming to a realization of what the basic problem is:  placing the mentally ill in nursing homes alongside a geriatric population is a really horrible idea.  Unfortunately, the solution is going to taking money and resources, both of which are in short supply right now.

My prediction: for as much anger and disgust as the Tribune series has raised, we will continue muddling through with this same program -- until something really awful happens that catches the public's attention and really demands a solution.  In the mean time, many of the problems resulting from will continue to fly below the radar, to the detriment of thousands of Illinois nursing home residents who deserve much better.

Troubled Chicago nursing home loses funding

Somerset Place, the troubled nursing home located in the Uptown neighborhood, is losing Medicare and Medicaid funding and may be forced to shut its doors, which would cause the roughly 300 residents of the facility to have to find new nursing homes.  The loss of funding follows a series of articles in the Chicago Tribune which brought the nursing home into an unwanted spotlight.

The nursing home houses many mentally ill residents, including approximately 66 convicted felons.  The Tribune articles depicted a facility where the residents were out control, behaving violently toward on another, the staff, and in the community.  According to the article which reported on the loss of funding, the staff claimed that they were short-handed and lacked support from the ownership of the facility, and even though management was trying to correct the problems, the staff believed that it would revert to its prior form as soon as the regulators were gone.

Some of the residents interviewed for the article were upset about the possibility of being forced into other facilities with a shuttering of Somerset Place.  From one perspective they are right:  many studies have shown that moving residents from facility to facility does have some detrimental effects on the well-being of the residents, as they tend to become disoriented in the new facility and lose the benefit of a certain amount of experience in caring for them.

From another perspective, families of nursing homes near Somerset Place, especially those with large numbers of empty beds, should be upset also:  the residents from Somerset Place may be coming to your parent's nursing home -- and in large numbers -- and they will be bringing their own set of problematic behaviors that the staff at the new facility is not aware or or necessarily prepared to cope with effectively.

My prediction as to what will occur when and if Somerset Place is closed:  many of those residents will be moved to nearby facilities, especially ones that have large numbers of empty beds, and within six months, you will see increasing problems in the nursing homes that accept these residents in the form of resident-on-resident assaults and a decline in  the quality of care that other residents receive, leading to an increase in things like nursing home falls and/or the incidence of pressure ulcers.

Texas nursing home fined for pressure ulcers

A Forth Worth nursing home agreed to pay $1.6 million in civil and criminal penalties to settle charges that it submitted false claims to Medicare and provided inadequate care to nursing home residents causing bed sores.  The charges included allegations that the nursing home engaged in false charting through "charting parties" to document care that was never actually provided, understaffed nursing homes, and failed to provide prescribed medications to resident .  There were also allegations that the bed sores became infested with maggots and that some residents had to have amputations done due to the bed sores.

The plea agreement included a deferred prosecution agreement which required the nursing home's owner to abide by certain conditions for a period of two years after which the criminal charges against him will be dismissed.  In the meantime, he will remain in charge of the nursing home, which will continue to receive public dollars.

Nursing homes are one of the few explicitly for-profit sectors in the health care industry, and in an effort to fatten the bottoms line, nursing home operators sometimes cut corners.  Unfortunately, shortcomings in the delivery of care over time results in residents developing conditions such as bed sores.  Put simply, they do not happen overnight, and are many times the result of business decisions which hamper the ability of nurses on the floor to deliver proper care.  This case in Texas was an especially dramatic example of that.