How A Nursing Home Abuse Lawyer Helps Seniors (2024)

Types of Elder Abuse

According to many sources, roughly 10% of seniors experience some form of abuse. The vast majority of abuse cases involve family members. However, the second-most common source of abuse comes from caregivers. These non-family workers account for nearly 13% of elder abusers.

Elder abuse can take any of the following forms:

Physical Abuse

Physical abuse involves the deliberate use of force or threats of force against the senior for illegitimate purposes. This force may be applied by staff members who hit, kick, or otherwise deliberately make harmful contact with residents. It can also include more passive forms of physical abuse, such as using restraints on the senior.

These cases may be difficult for elderly abuse attorneys to prove because seniors are susceptible to injuries due to accidents like slips and falls. Bruises, broken bones, burns, and other orthopedic injuries can happen for reasons other than staff abuse.

Moreover, occasional force might be necessary to protect nursing home residents from harming themselves or others. For example, if a dementia patient becomes violent while trying to leave the facility, some force might be needed to stop them.

Neglect

When a nursing home admits residents, it undertakes a duty to care for all their needs. When the staff fails to meet those needs, the residents can suffer physically and mentally. Some needs that might go unmet in neglect cases include the following:

• Food

• Water

• Cooling or heating

• Clothing

• Hygiene

Depending on the type of facility, the staff may also be obligated to provide medical care. Nursing homes usually provide skilled nursing care around the clock. Nursing malpractice might qualify as neglect. Assisted living centers typically have a registered nurse on call, but the facility usually only provides first aid and transports the resident to a hospital for additional care.

Mental Abuse

Mental abuse includes emotional and psychological stress deliberately inflicted on residents. Some examples of mental abuse include the following:

• Yelling

• Belittling

• Harassing

• Bullying

• Threatening

• Discriminating based on race, sex, sexual preference, or other characteristics

Mental abuse diminishes the resident’s quality of life by causing depression, anxiety, emotional distress, and fear.

Sexual Abuse

Sexual abuse includes a range of actions to force a resident into an unwanted sexual interaction. Staff members might engage in sexual harassment and unwanted sex talk directed toward residents. The most extreme cases involve unwanted touching, sexual abuse, and rape.

Financial Misconduct

Seniors are vulnerable to financial abuse due to dementia or other cognitive difficulties. Some forms of financial abuse by residential facilities include the following:

• Improper charges for products or services by the facility

• Mismanagement of the resident’s account

• Embezzlement from the resident

• Financial scams by staff members

• Theft of a resident’s property

• Identity theft

In all of these cases, the facility or its staff gains improper use and benefits from the senior's money, property, or government benefits.

Liability for Nursing Home Abuse

Nursing homes may be liable for nursing home abuse in two ways. First, under a doctrine called respondeat superior, employers are generally liable for the acts of their employees performed in the scope of their job duties. Respondeat superior usually arises in cases of negligence. For example, if a nursing assistant forgets to check on residents overnight and a senior falls out of bed and breaks a bone, the nursing home may be liable for nursing home neglect.

Liability under respondeat superior is less clear when the nursing home staff engages in intentional acts. This legal doctrine usually only applies to intentional acts that were either part of the job or foreseeable.

Fortunately, there is a second ground for holding nursing homes liable for abuse and neglect. The nursing home facility can also commit negligence independent of the acts of its staff. For example, if the facility fails to pay its heating bill, it may be liable for the residents’ suffering.

Some examples of institutional actions that may create liability include negligence in any of the following areas:

• Hiring enough staff to manage the residents

• Conducting background checks before hiring

• Training or supervising workers

• Conducting drug testing of workers

• Supplying the facility

• Repairing and maintaining the facility

In many cases, residents and their families do not necessarily need to point to a specific worker’s actions. Instead, they can hire an elder law attorney who can often attribute the neglect to the facility itself based on the business’s duties to its residents.

How a Nursing Home Abuse Lawyer Recovers Compensation

A retirement home abuse lawyer provides the following services to nursing home residents and their families:

• Listening to the senior’s story to determine what happened

• Investigating the facility to obtain records, videos, and other evidence

• Filing a claim with the facility’s insurer

• Negotiating with the facility’s attorneys to settle the claim

• Filing a lawsuit if a nursing home abuse or neglect settlement cannot be reached

Of these steps, the most difficult part of the case is often the investigation. The nursing home and its lawyers may try to stonewall the investigation. Your nursing home and assisted living abuse attorney can usually use the discovery process in litigation to uncover this evidence.

ConsumerShield Can Help You Find a Nursing Home Abuse Attorney

ConsumerShield helps nursing home residents and their families by reviewing their cases and referring them to lawyers who can help. Contact us for a free case evaluation.