Nursing Home Abuse and Medical Malpractice

Over 1.5 million US citizens, comprising parents, grandparents, and siblings, are known to be residents in nursing homes. Usually, these nursing homes and other types of living establishments with assistance charge exorbitant prices. Because of the high expenses, we trust that our loved ones are safe and living luxurious lives. However, regrettably, this is not always the case.

While some homes provide safety and good care, others treat residents shabbily and in many cases, abuse of residents is also known to prevail.

According to a study prepared by the minority staff of the Special Investigations Division of the House Government Reform Committee, in 30% of nursing homes around the US (5,283 facilities), nearly 9,000 instances of abuse have allegedly been reported within a span of two years, that is, from January 1999 to January 2001.

Types of Nursing Home Abuse

Some of the more common types of nursing home abuse include:

· Bedsores

· Malnutrition

· Mental abuse

· Physical abuse

· Dehydration

· Sexual abuse

· Elopement and wandering

· Restraints and

· Slip and fall

Is a Loved One a Nursing Home Abuse Victim?

One of the major problems that nursing homes face is that the employees are usually under-trained and the homes are usually understaffed. This becomes a problem for the residents as they depend on the workers for basic necessities such as food and water, medication, toileting, interaction, mobility and grooming. The facility is considered to be negligent when it fails to provide essential treatment and care, as well as goods and services. Some instances of negligence in nursing homes are as follows:

· Failure to prevent malnutrition and/or dehydration

· Failure to provide decent living standards

· Failure to assist in personal hygiene

· Failure to provide satisfactory treatment and services for residents who have no control over bathroom issues

· Failure to provide convenient supervision and devices to prevent mishaps

· Failure to provide sufficient medical care

· Failure to ensure that inhabitants are victims of medication inaccuracies

· Failure to prevent residents from developing bedsores; or, in case a resident already has bedsores, failure to provide adequate treatment to bolster healing.

Statistics on Abuse of the Elderly

According to a joint study carried out by Cornell University and the New York City Department for the Aging in 2010, entitled Under the Radar: New York State Elder Abuse Prevalence Study, the incidence rate of elder abuse is more than 20 times higher than the number of cases referred to social services and law enforcement. Abuse in psychological form is most common. A minimum of 260,000 elderly adults were found to be the victims of at least some form of abuse just in New York alone.

If your loved one has been a victim of nursing home abuse, you should immediately call one of the reliable and experienced medical malpractice attorneys at Rosenberg, Minc, Falkoff & Wolff of RMFW Law at 212-344-1000.

Give us a call. We know this arena. We have won millions of dollars for past clients and you too can be on this special list. If you have a viable case, we would be happy to carry the legal baton for you all the way to the finish line. We know how to build outstanding cases and we know how to attack the opposition's case. RMFW Law is the best law firm in this city.

We know what legal buttons to press and when to press them. We know what a winning case looks like. If you want to be in tremendous legal hands, give us a call.