Nursing Home malpractice comes in many forms, and has many names. Some call it nursing home abuse or neglect, others elder abuse, but whatever the name, it’s increasingly becoming a problem in the United States. And it’s not just nursing homes. Residential facilities and home health care providers can commit malpractice as well.
Walton Law Firm LLP has represented victims of nursing home malpractice for more than a decade, and has learned that nursing home malpractice can come in many forms. The most common being simple neglect – the failure to notice a change in the resident’s condition, whether it be the occurrence of bed sores, the development of dehydration or malnutrition, or an obvious injury that is not promptly addressed. The law defines neglect simply as the failure to provide care for a person’s physical and mental needs, and to keep them free from health and safety hazards.
More serious cases are those of intentional conduct such as physical abuse, or the intentional mistreatment of a resident, often in retaliation for some prior act. Or the failure to provide basic care because of issues related to under staffing, such as cases involving multiple falls because staff would not respond to call lights. These cases can fairly be described not as just malpractice, but a conscious decision on the part of the nursing facility to expose residents to the risk of harm.
Ultimately, any unexpected injury, illness, infection, or death should be promptly investigated to determine if the underlying causes in nursing home malpractice, neglect, or abuse.
Walton Law Firm LLP represents individuals and families of victims of neglect and abuse in the nursing home setting. It accepts cases in the Southern California counties of San Diego, Los Angeles, Riverside, Orange, San Bernardino, Ventura, and Imperial.