Illinois Nursing Home Abuse Blog

The vast majority of the $54,000,000 award against ManorCare in a wrongful death case was for punitive damages. Lawyers for the family stated that they hoped that the nursing home neglect lawsuit would ensure that the types of neglect that the New Mexico nursing home resident suffered would not happen again. Lawyers for the woman's family indicate that staffers knew about her intestinal bleeding for several days. And yet, they did nothing about it. Then, when a staffer found the woman dead in her blood soaked bedsheets, the nursing home cleared and cleaned up the area, even though the doctor who performed the autopsy testified that these materials should have been sent to the Office of the Medical Investigator along with the body. The epitome of ManorCare's negligent care for its residents is the fact that charting procedures were so inadequate that the woman was given an insulin injection two and a half hours after her death.The attempted cover-up and the resident neglect were nothing new for New Mexico ManorCare facilities. At trial, lawyers presented evidence that ManorCare had previously been reported as having improperly trained staff, using improper restraints, and neglecting its residents.

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A New Mexico jury has recently awarded $54,000,000 to the family of a woman who died at a ManorCare nursing home. Lawyers for the deceased nursing home resident stated that the ManorCare nursing home failed to follow its own procedures in sending residents to the hospital. As a result, the woman bled to her death. The jury awarded $4,000,000 for the wrongful death and $50,000,000 in punitive damages.

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A lawsuit was filed today against ManorCare Nursing Homes and Advocate Health Hospital in Illinois on behalf of a woman who was a victim of nursing home abuse and neglect.

With instances of nursing home abuse and neglect on the rise and an aging baby boomer population, it is alarming how underpaid, poorly trained, and underappreciated nursing home staff members and care givers are. As America’s elderly population increases, the caregiver labor force hardly grows at all. Nursing homes and other care facilities are already unsettlingly understaffed. As of 2005, average caregivers were paid under $10 an hour and a quarter of the workforce had no health insurance. Even worse, the Supreme Court recently ruled that America’s one million home-care workers are not entitled to overtime pay under federal law. The Department of Health and Human Services said that the caregiver gap is the most acute in rural areas with few immigrants, as thousands of nurses from India, Pakistan and elsewhere work in other facilities. This is also at the expense of elderly patients who suffer from abuse and neglect and are forced to make do with ill-trained and overburdened helpers in understaffed nursing homes. The nursing home industry has over 100,000 vacancies for nurses and nursing aides and an annual turnover rate of 70% as nurses quit the profession or leave for higher-paying jobs. This high turnover creates the need for more training and recruiting of nurses, and the use of temporary contract workers. These extra costs amount to over $4 billion a year.

A nursing home employee was recently charged with caretaker abuse by neglect after she was caught taking pain patches off the body of an 89-year-old cancer patient. The employee failed to provide the patient with his prescribed medication and deprived him of his necessary medical care.

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The National Pressure Ulcer Advisory Panel recently released a new set of guidelines for health care providers to use in staging pressure ulcers. These updates reflect a better understanding of pressure ulcers, and they are intended to help differentiate pressure ulcers from other types of wounds. In addition, the new guidelines are expected to increase clinical utility of the staging system by providing greater uniformity, clarity, and succinctness.

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As the care that elderly parents require increases with their age, adult children frequently struggle to keep up with their parents' needs. A recent poll indicated that 41% of baby boomers are providing either financial or personal care, with another 37% indicating that they plan to do so in the future. However, as adult children begin to care for their aging parents, the tolls are financial, physical, and emotional.

The costs of caring for a parent go beyond the expenses of prescriptions. The time demands of caring for a parent can require a reduction in the hours a family member can work. The physical demands are also taxing, as family members who care for their parents must find the energy to do so before work, after work, and sometimes in the middle of the night. Finally, the emotional demands are substantial as the child must now assume the role and responsibilities of the parent. Although the decision to place a parent into senior day care, an assisted living facility, or a nursing home can be difficult on several levels, the most important thing to consider is the best interests of the elderly parent.

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A federal lawsuit has been filed against a Texas company which alleges that serious accounts of nursing home abuse and neglect were present in its five St. Louis area homes. Residents suffered from dehydration, weight loss, and bed sores. The seriousness of some of these pressure sores ultimately led to amputations. The suit also cites incidents where residents were allowed to wander and exit the facilities, where the staff failed to administer proper medication, and where the residents were forced to live in unsanitary conditions. The US Attorney alleges that the homes were seriously understaffed. The suit also accuses the company of false and fraudulent billings to Medicare and Medicaid programs.

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A 60-year-old nursing home resident was recently charged with indecent assault and battery charges after he was found sexually assaulting disabled woman living at the facility. This is the second instance of sexual assault in recent years at Golden Living Center in Norwood, Massachusetts, formally known as Emerald Court. In the precious incident of nursing home abuse and neglect, a male resident and registered sex offender was caught sexually assaulting another male resident.

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Despite the growing population of seniors in the U.S., the AARP Public Policy Institute announced that the number of seniors in nursing homes has decreased. A major contributor to this statistic is the increased number of options available to the elderly. In contrast to the situtaion a decade ago where the options for seniors were limited to skilled care nursing homes, seniors today have the option of various types of less-supported living. From at home care to senior day care to assisted living facilities, these attractive options can better balance the health and supervision needs of seniors with the need for independence. For seniors, services that are more tailored to their individual needs often results in a better quality of care.

The range of services that these alternatives provide range from at-home meal preparation to living facilities with full-time health care staff. While these alternatives to nursing home care can provide significant cost savings, these alternatives frequently require more of an active care-provider role from family members. In addition, families of seniors benefitting from at home care or assisted living should be aware that the federal regulation of nursing homes may not apply to less intensive senior care such as assisted living facilities.

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Federal authorities have joined two nurses who have filed a qui tam action against a company that operated five nursing homes in the St. Louis area. Qui tam lawsuits, or whistleblower lawsuits, are filed on behalf of the United States government. In this case, the whistleblower nurses had knowledge that the nursing homes they worked in were defrauding the government by charging Medicare and Medicaid for services that were actually "worthless." Cathedral Rock slashed its nursing staff to cut costs, failed to pay property taxes, failed to pay vendors, continued to employ staff who failed drug screenings, failed to properly lock up medications, and consistently neglected its residents.

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The Patient Safety and Abuse Prevention Act was introduced by Senators Pete Domenici and Herb Kohl, chairman of the Senate Special Committee on Aging, and it would require comprehensive criminal background checks on long term care workers who have direct access to residents. The checks would include requiring nursing homes to screen prospective employees – while providing supervised provisional employment for thirty days – by checking criminal records, abuse and neglect agencies in all states, records from agencies such as Medicaid fraud control units and professional licensing boards. Sates would be required to penalize facilities for noncompliance and fine facilities that knowingly employ a worker with a criminal background.
Please help pass this legislation! This bill (S. 1577) is intended to stop workers with criminal records from working with vulnerable people.

Click here to read the bill
Click here to read the National Citizen's Coalition for Nursing Home Reform's letter of support

The Arkansas Supreme Court upheld the class action status of a lawsuit filed by 489 nursing home residents who were victims of abuse and neglect. Residents allege that for almost four years the home violated the rights of nursing home residents as it failed to provide adequate care and staffing at the facility. The nursing home appealed class action certification claiming that questions of liability, causation and injury were too individualized and should be addressed separately. The court said the home would benefit from a class action suit because it would be more efficient than 489 separate law suits all regarding the same issues of abuse and neglect.

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A hedge fund has called for the sale of Sunrise Senior Living Inc., a large United States owner of assisted living facilities and nursing homes, including many in Illinois and the Chicago area. The company employs about 39,000 people and operates 444 facilities in the US, Canada, Germany, and Britain. The fund cites problems with management and accounting as reasons for the sale, finding new management or merging or restructuring the Virginia-based company. The US Securities and Exchange Commission opened a formal probe into its accounting and insider stock sales. The Illinois Department of Public Health has also investigated numerous cases of nursing home abuse and neglect in Illinois Sunrise facilities. The law firm of Levin & Perconti has represented a number of these victims.

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A 92-year-old Alzheimer’s patient was sexually assaulted by an employee of Pine Run Community Nursing Home. The family has sued the nursing home alleging that the home was negligent in failing to protect the mentally incapacitated woman. The home and the assaulter, who was sentenced to two to four years in prison, are being sued for civil damages. The employee entered and exited the nursing home through a service entrance and the suit claims the home should have done more to restrict access to vulnerable patients. The assault was discovered by an employee who noticed the patient’s door was closed, entered and witnessed the assault. Unfortunately it had been occurring for three years. The suit aims to collect fair compensation and injustice for injuries from which the woman suffered but also to send a message to nursing homes that abuse and neglect does not go unnoticed in the hopes of preventing acts like this one in the future.

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The family of an 88-year-old nursing home resident recently filed a lawsuit against a nursing home for negligence. The family claims that the home neglected to supervise patients allowing a 25-year-old resident to attack and stab the woman multiple times in the neck. The family alleges that the nursing home was negligent in admitting the patient with a serious mental disorder and a violent criminal past without performing a background check. The nursing home also failed to prevent the violent patient from accessing sharp objects. The victim’s family is also suing the violent patient’s doctors and other mental health facilities he attended for medical malpractice as they failed to treat the patient with proper medication.

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States all over the country are grappling with the issue of who is mentally fit to vote. Nursing home residents, especially those with Alzheimer’s, are coming into question, as well as people living with other disabilities. The mentally disabled and their advocates are fighting to secure voting rights while psychiatrists and those that work with the elderly are concerned about the risks of voting by people with conditions like Alzheimer’s and dementia. Many people with dementia vote or want to vote but it is important to ensure that they are not pressured to vote certain ways. A New Jersey nursing home employee won a county election but was forced to step down after it was revealed that she took advantage of mentally incapacitated residents. Similar accusations have been reported in Alabama, South Carolina and other states. This summer, lawyers led by the American Bar Association and a group of psychiatrists will publish recommendations for national standards suggesting that people should only be banned from voting if they cannot indicate a “specific desire to participate in the voting process.”

New Jersey’s constitution currently forbids an “idiot or insane person” from voting and an amendment may appear on the November ballot. Advocates want the words removed, but fear they will be replaced with vague and restrictive language. A current Missouri lawsuit seeks to overturn the current state voting ban for people under full guardianship because of mental illness. A current debate in Rhode Island concerns the voting rights of the criminally insane. Only two states allows jailed felons to vote but advocates argue that the criminally insane are evaluated based on dangerousness and not voting capacity, and that voting can be part of rehabilitation moving them “closer to society.” State laws are inconsistent, but the emerging model is based on the 2001 ruling in Maine which allows people to vote if they understand the voting process and can make the choice. Assessing such qualifications is still controversial.

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Nursing home residents receive an exemption from Part D co-payments, and this exemption should be extended to assisted living and board & care patients who receive Medicaid. Medications can eat away most of these residents’ incomes and residents of community-based facilities should have the same rights as nursing home residents. So ask your Senator to support the Home and Community Based Services Co-payment Equity Act (S. 1107).

Click here to read the bill