Nursing Homes Abuse Blog
A Prime Example Of How Not To Treat An Injured Nursing Home Patient.... Ignoring Them
I've got a confession to make. Sometimes when I'm in my office I make personal calls. Sometimes I even take time away from my day to forward email chains of perverted jokes to friends.&nbs...
Keep reading »More than 1,800 people die each year in nursing home falls. Knowing the inherent risks that falls pose to nursing home patients, nursing homes need to create and implement a fall prevention program for every patient.
Fall prevention programs should identify the characteristics that put the patient at risk of falling and create safeguards for staff to implement that will minimize the risk of falls in the future.
Even after a fall-related care plan is in place, nursing home staff should always be on the lookout for residents who may require assistance getting around. If residents have a history of falls, the facility should consider using alarms on chairs or beds to notify the staff when the person attempts to walk on their own.
Frequent Causes of Nursing Home Falls
Some of the common causes of nursing home falls include:
- Hazards in the nursing home – wet floors, poor lighting, improper bed heights, improperly maintained wheelchairs, or equipment left out of place
- Medications – drugs that affect the central nervous system, such as sedatives and anti-anxiety (or psychoactive) drugs
- Improperly fitting shoes or incorrect walking aids
- Frequent use of restraints
- Failure to provide assistance or provide specialized bathing equipment, including chairs, stands and grips
- Transfer into and out of bed
- Failing to engage locks on wheelchairs
- Failure to maintain stairways and walkways
Nursing Home Liability For Falls
When evaluating nursing home fall cases, Rosenfeld Injury Lawyers evaluates the circumstances surrounding the specific incident as well as the patient’s fall-related history at the facility. Not all fall-related injuries involving nursing home patients will give rise to compensation. However, in many situations, there is a pattern of falls and a clear failure on the part of staff to implement fall-prevention precautions.
It is important to review the patient’s complete chart from a facility to evaluate liability in nursing home fall cases. When liability is established, the facility may be responsible for the associated pain, decline in the quality of life, and medical expenses related to treatment.
Related Articles From Rosenfeld Injury Lawyers:
The most dangerous part of the day for many nursing home patients may be getting out of bed in the morning. When staff fail to supervise or provide proper assistance to nursing home patients during transfers, patients are at risk for falls or being dropped by staff.
Disabled nursing home patients and those with physical limitations must be carefully monitored to avoid injuries while being transferred from one device to another….(continue reading with the link above)
How Many Falls Is Enough To Impose Responsibility On Nursing Home?
Falls are a common problem facing elderly people in and out of nursing homes. By some accounts, every elderly person in America will fall at least one time over the course of the next year. Many of these falls will cause injury and some will even cause death.
In the case of falls occurring in the nursing home setting, many clients and their families focus their attention on tying a specific number of falls to a facilities responsibility. Truth be told, there really is no magic number when it comes to identifying a specific number of falls after which a nursing home or hospital becomes responsible….(continue reading with the link above)
Medical Facilities Must Use Wheel-Locks & Supervision To Protect Patients In Wheelchairs
Perhaps the most basic safeguard nursing homes and hospitals can implement with wheelchair patients is the utilization of wheel-locks. Too often, physically disabled patients are simply propped up in their wheelchairs with the assumption that they face little chance of getting injured.
However, as I have discussed before, wheelchair patients must be properly supervised in order to minimize the chance of accidental injury due to the rolling of a chair or falling from it. The lack of supervision appears to have played a role in the case of a Connecticut nursing home patient who literally rolled from the facility to his death….(continue reading with the link above)