The Westwood nursing home neglect attorneys at Jason Stone Injury Lawyers can help. We understand the sensitive and often urgent nature of these cases. Our Westwood personal injury lawyers can help you get justice and compensation for your loved one and hold the responsible parties accountable for these unthinkable acts.
Common Signs of Potential Nursing Home Abuse
Signs of abuse in long-term care facilities are often overlooked as mere aspects of aging or cognitive decline. However, certain injuries, health changes, and behaviors should prompt concern that mistreatment may be taking place.
Residents themselves are sometimes reluctant or unable to report what happened due to embarrassment, impaired memory, or lack of understanding. Some signs that warrant further review include:
- Unexplained bruises, cuts, sores, or wounds inconsistent with normal daily living
- Malnutrition or dehydration despite receiving meals and fluids
- New onset confusion, withdrawal, or heightened anxiety without medical cause
- Unapproved withdrawals from financial accounts indicating financial exploitation
- Declining personal hygiene beyond what mobility limitations allow
- Changed behavior or health reported by regular family visitors unfamiliar to staff explanations
Paying attention to subtle signs can help expose abuse that victims may be unable or unwilling to communicate due to the vulnerable nature of living in a nursing home environment.
When you begin to suspect your loved one is being abused, it is advisable to contact an experienced nursing home abuse attorney in Westwood. We can begin an investigation on your behalf and help you report it to the right agencies.
Signs that a Loved One is in Immediate Danger in a Nursing Care Facility
If you believe your loved one is in immediate danger, it’s critical to take action now. The following signs should not be ignored. Here are some signs that could indicate a resident is in immediate danger from abuse in a nursing home:
- Visible and Severe Injuries: Visible severe injuries like deep cuts, burns, and broken bones that appear non-accidental in nature.
- Unusual Bruising: Signs of physical assault like bruises in the shape of hands or objects. Bruises or wounds in various stages of healing indicate repeated attacks.
- Medical signs: Symptoms of medical neglect leading to acute health issues. This could include dehydration, malnutrition, untreated infections, pressure sores, or prescription med errors.
- Unattended or wandering: Evidence the resident is not being properly supervised. For example, being left unattended for long periods in soiled clothing/bedding.
- Sex abuse: Signs of sexual abuse like unexplained bruising/injuries to genital areas, torn/bloody clothing, sexually transmitted diseases.
- Resident behavior: Agitated behavior from the nursing home resident, along with claims or hints of ongoing threats, harassment, or abuse by staff.
- Resident fear: Refusal by the resident to be left alone with or near certain caregivers due to expressed fear/discomfort.
- Seeing abuse: Witnessing abusive acts firsthand, like hitting, slapping, kicking, rough handling, verbal threats, or humiliation.
If any of these alarming indicators are observed, the resident’s safety should be considered at high risk and immediate intervention taken like contacting 911, admins, and abuse authorities. The goal in imminent danger is removing the threat and person from harm.
Remain with your loved one until the threat is dealt with. Contact a nursing home abuse lawyer right away for further assistance and instructions.
How Can a Lawyer Help When My Loved One Has Been Abused in a Care Facility?
Here are some of the key ways a nursing home abuse attorney can help:
- Investigate the situation thoroughly: We will work to obtain records like medical reports, staff logs, video evidence, and witness testimony to fully understand what happened.
- Hold the responsible parties accountable: We can pursue legal action, like filing a lawsuit against the facility for negligence, mistreatment, or regulatory violations.
- Increase oversight and prevent repeat offenses: Lawsuits put financial and reputational pressure on facilities to improve standards and personnel training to protect other residents.
- Recover compensation: Our lawyers will pursue the maximum compensation possible for past and future medical costs, pain and suffering, and any other losses due to the harms suffered from abuse or neglect.
- Ease the emotional toll: Handling complex legal matters allows the victim and family to focus on recovery instead of stressful paperwork/calls.
- Achieve accountability and closure: With an advocate on your side, you can find justice and peace of mind knowing the facility is held responsible.
An experienced elder abuse attorney can comprehensively address your situation and help protect other vulnerable residents from similar threats.
A Fall Can Result in a Liability Claim
Though you may not think you have a claim, we can help you assess and determine if negligence caused your loved one’s injury. Consider the following case we handled:
According to Medicare.gov, a resident has the right to receive adequate supervision and be given assistive devices to be protected from accidents and injury. Ledgewood Healthcare Corporation is a for-profit rehabilitation and skilled nursing center located in Beverly, Massachusetts.
Ledgewood boasts that its team “provides outstanding short-term rehabilitation” services. Further, they state that its team of professionals work to “get you or your loved one home at the highest level of function possible.”
They promise “attentive, around-the-clock nursing care from our team of trusted physicians, nurses, and nursing assistants to ensure your health and safety at every moment.”These promises were not upheld to the Tretola family, as Ms. Tretola suffered a fall, leading to her functional decline and subsequent death.
Ledgewood should not have accepted Ms. Tretola for admission due to her high fall risk and the facility’s inability to manage her or implement adequate fall care prevention plans to ensure her safety.
However, after accepting Ms. Tretola, a fall care plan specifically designed for her should have been implemented. Instead, the nursing staff failed to perform wheelchair or positioning assessments, provide proper assistive devices, and assist with repositioning her wheelchair.
While at Ledgewood, Ms. Tretola suffered a fall from her wheelchair and sustained cervical spine fractures, causing her death. The facility did not ensure that Ms. Tretola was provided the necessary care and services to attain or maintain the highest practicable physical, mental, and psychosocial well-being in accordance with her comprehensive assessment and plan of care.
The defendant’s failure to provide Ms. Tretola with adequate care prior to her fall on or about September 26, 2018, directly and approximately resulted in her death on November 2, 2018.
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