Articles Posted in Wrongful Eviction

by

obed-hernandez-592136-unsplash-copy-212x300Nursing homes, or skilled nursing facilities, in Vista and throughout San Diego County were the topic of discussion in a recent article in The San Diego Union-Tribune. More specifically, do family members and seniors have any recourse when a skilled nursing facility says it is time to leave? The article presents the following scenario for readers in Southern California to consider: “Your family member, who was sent to a skilled nursing rehabilitation facility after a hospitalization, is told to leave before he/she is ready.” There are many different reasons that a nursing home might tell a patient it is time to leave. In some scenarios, these reasons are legitimate, but in other situations, such actions could rise to the level of nursing home abuse or neglect.

Reasons a Skilled Nursing Facility in Vista Might Tell a Patient to Leave      

Why do skilled nursing facilities tell patients it is time to leave? According to the article, there are numerous reasons, and some are better than others. Generally speaking, the following explanations for why your family member needs to leave the facility are not usually sufficient:

Continue reading

by

fabrizio-verrecchia-221046-unsplash-copy-300x200Nursing home evictions have become a serious issue within the larger topic of nursing home abuse and neglect in California and throughout the country. Organizations such as AARP are getting involved in stopping illegal nursing home evictions and questioning the ways in which both federal and state law provides protections to seniors who are being kicked out of facilities. While many commentators are discussing illegal evictions from nursing homes, what about illegal evictions from assisted-living facilities and residential care facilities for the elderly (RCFEs) in California?

All of this talk about unlawful nursing home evictions begs the question: What are an elderly person’s rights when it comes to evictions from RCFEs? California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform (CANHR) provides a fact sheet on RCFEs and eviction protection. We want to discuss RCFE evictions with you and help you to understand steps to take when an elderly loved one becomes vulnerable.

What are the Lawful Reasons that an Elderly Resident of an RCFE can be Evicted?

Continue reading

by

jonathan-adeline-259286-copy-300x200Whether you are reading about nursing home evictions in Poway or elsewhere in Southern California, it is important to think carefully about the rising rates of evictions and how these actions might rise to the level of elder and dependent adult abuse in the state. According to a recent article in California Healthline, more nursing homes in California are evicting patients who allegedly cannot pay after being assessed higher fees, while others are evicting residents and patients with certain illnesses and medical conditions, such as Alzheimer’s disease or other forms of dementia.

Do improper evictions rise to the level of nursing home abuse? Can you file an elder abuse lawsuit following an improper eviction from a skilled nursing facility in California?

Evictions Complaints on the Rise in California

Continue reading

by

800px-Woman_readingOver the past several months, California residents have been hearing news about nursing homes in our state and throughout the country evicting patients for whom it is more difficult to provide care. For example, an article in Modern Healthcare emphasized that nursing home patients who are “targeted for eviction are frequently poor and suffering from dementia.” Numerous lawsuits have been filed in relation to such evictions, and a recent press release from the California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform (CANHR) suggests that elder safety advocates may be gaining ground.

Modesto Elder Care Center Cited for Evicting ‘Long-Term’ Residents

According to the press release, Avalon Care Center, a Modesto-area nursing home, has been cited for illegal patient eviction practices. The press release notes that the California Department of Public Health (DPH) recently levied “a whopping 29 citations” against the care center in Modesto “for engaging in a reprehensible and systematic illegal eviction program to force out undesirable ‘long-term’ residents.” Why did the facility evict these residents? It was not actually for some of the same reasons noted in the Modern Healthcare article mentioned above.

Continue reading

by

red_coatWhen an elderly California resident requires care in a nursing home, it is often because he or she can no longer live at home and requires more care than a place such as a residential care facility for the elderly (RCFE) or assisted-living facility might be able to provide. However, according to a recent article from the Associated Press, nursing home patients who are more challenging and for whom it is more difficult for staff members to provide care are being targeted for eviction. The topic of nursing home evictions and elder abuse has been an issue for several months now, with advocates arguing that nursing homes and other facilities are refusing to readmit patients following hospital stays. For example, an NPR report emphasized the severity of these allegations and the implications for senior health and well-being.

Yet now, according to an analysis conducted by the Associated Press, it looks as though patients at skilled nursing facilities who require more extended care than other patients may also be subject to wrongful evictions. When elderly patients who need nursing home care are evicted without warning and for reasons beyond the resident’s control, are we looking at situations of nursing home abuse?

Seniors with Dementia Alleged to be Targeted by Skilled Nursing Facilities

Continue reading

by

file3451272140532If you live in a nursing home, do you have the same rights as a tenant who rents a home from a landlord? According to a recent report from NPR, numerous nursing home residents who live the facility for a temporary inpatient hospital visit return to the nursing home only to learn that they have been evicted. As the article makes clear, this pattern results each year in thousands of nursing home residents finding themselves without a place to live, and that often leads to less-than-ideal situations that can involve elder abuse. Currently, federal law protects nursing home residents from these kinds of evictions, but as the article underscores, “those rules are rarely enforced by the states.” As such, California nursing home residents have decided to file claims against the state of California.

Plaintiffs File Claims Over Nursing Home Evictions

According to the NPR report, when nursing home residents cannot return to their rooms at the nursing facility, they are left with very expensive hospital bills and often the inability to receive the specific kind of care provided in a nursing home. For instance, one plaintiff who was evicted from his nursing home is currently living in his hospital room at Sutter Medical Center in Sacramento. At the end of May 2015, his nursing home sent him to the hospital to receive treatment for pneumonia. However, once the pneumonia had been treated, the nursing home would not readmit him. As such, he has been living at the hospital for about 260 days now. The financial costs are very high: Medicaid is paying “about 2.5 times what his nursing home cost.”

Continue reading

by

SmartMoney.com has an article out entitled 10 Things Nursing Homes Won’t Tell You. Which has been adapted from the book “1,001 Things They Won’t Tell You: An Insider’s Guide to Spending, Saving, and Living Wisely,” by Jonathan Dahl.

Walton Law Firm thought you might like to see the list:

1. “We’re careless about the drugs we give out.”

Continue reading

by

If you or a loved one is being threatened by eviction from your assisted living facility (or residential care facility), it is important to know that the law is on your side. Under the California Code of Regulations, an assisted living resident can be eviction for only five reasons:

1. A failure to pay rent within 10 days of its due date;

2. Failing to comply with state or local law (e.g. using illegal drugs, assault/battery, etc);

Continue reading

by

Many nursing homes are now marketing themselves as “rehabilitation” facilities in an effort to attract the ideal resident: one who stays under 100 days then goes elsewhere. Why? Because Medicare provides lucrative fees for skilled nursing care. It is not uncommon for nursing homes to discharge residents, often prematurely, when the Medicare benefits end.

Most people are unaware that when Medicare coverage ends, a resident who needs skilled nursing care has a right to stay, either by paying privately, or qualifying for Medi-Cal coverage. Under Welfare and Institutions Code section 14124.7, no nursing home that accepts Medi-Cal payments can evict, or transfer within a facility, any person who changes the manner of paying from private or Medicare to Medi-Cal.

For more information on discharge and transfer rights in California nursing homes, see the fact sheet provided by California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform.

Continue reading

by

Elder abuse lawyers have all seen cases of residents being evicted from nursing homes, or refused readmission, for dubious reasons. We sometimes call it Medi-Cal prejudice; that is residents being refused admission to a nursing home for no other reasons than they are Medi-Cal recipients.

One former client of our firm called a nearby nursing home hoping to find a room for her mother, who was about to be discharged from the hospital. The first question from the nursing home was whether her mother was receiving Medi-Cal. Medicare, or private pay. When the daughter told the nursing facility her mother received Medi-Cal, she was promptly told there were no available beds, but that her mother could be put on a waiting list.

Homeless.jpgBeing a nurse herself and believing there were available beds, the daughter called the same facility the following day to see if there was room for her mother. Using a different name, she again asked if there were available beds, and this time, after informing the nursing home her mother received Medicare, she was told there were several rooms available, and that the facility would be happy to provide a tour that afternoon.

Continue reading
Justia Lawyer Rating
Super Lawyers
BBB Rating A+
Avvo Rating 10.0
Elder Justice Advocates
Consumer Attorneys California
AV Preeminent badge
Contact Information
North County Office
950 Boardwalk
#304
San Marcos, CA 92078
Toll Free: 866.607.1325 Local: 760.571.5500 Fax: 760.571.5501
San Diego Office
2169 1st Ave
San Diego, CA 92101
Toll Free: 866.607.1325

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Please do not include any confidential or sensitive information in a contact form, text message, or voicemail. The contact form sends information by non-encrypted email, which is not secure. Submitting a contact form, sending a text message, making a phone call, or leaving a voicemail does not create an attorney-client relationship.

Copyright © 2024, Walton Law Firm
JUSTIA Law Firm Blog Design