If you were to imagine the top ten major causes of death for people in America, what do you imagine would be on that list? Would you put preventable medical errors, which are made by people, possibly in nursing homes, tasked with keeping you healthy on the list? According to a recent report by the American Association for Justice’s recent report entitled “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” preventable medical errors is sixth on the list of major causes of death. Hundreds of thousands of Americans are killed or seriously injured by preventable medical errors every year!

Errors are a problem that affect everyone, but seniors are particularly vulnerable, especially seniors neglected in nursing homes. While representing just 13% of the population, senior citizens account for 34% of all adverse drug reactions. And of the 1.9 million adverse drug effects suffered every year by those in long term care, 70% are preventable! These problems are exacerbated when hospital administrators, who often put profits over people, and fail to make necessary changes because they deem these changes too costly. (more…)

According to pbs.org, in 2008 the average cost for a semi-private room in a nursing home was $5,448 per month ($65,385 a year). What kind of care, respect and attention would you expect for yourself or your beloved grandparent, parent, aunt, or uncle if you are spending $179 per day for care? The last thing you would expect would be physical, emotional, or sexual abuse, but unfortunately that is exactly what is happening to many seniors in nursing homes throughout the state. According to a recent report from the American Association for Justice, entitled “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” instead of receiving the loving care and attention you’d expect from these nursing homes, seniors are often ending up victims of nursing home abuse.

The abuse facing seniors is often the result of nursing homes negligent staff hiring. Many nursing homes fail to properly check the criminal records of its staff, or they run checks and ignore the results. This negligent hiring or employees with criminal records has devastating consequences leading to abuse for seniors. (more…)

Seniors are often the unwitting victims of frauds and scams by unscrupulous individuals. In the American Association for Justice’s recent report entitled “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” it appears that seniors are often the victims of nursing home neglect and of frauds perpetrated by large insurance companies as well.

During the 1980s and 1990s Interstate Service Insurance Agency signed up thousands of seniors for long-term care policies with promises of low premiums that would stay fixed. Despite their promises, the insurance company increased the “policy rate” which had the effect of raising premiums for everyone. Because of this scam, seniors saw their premiums increase by as much as 800 percent!

Unfortunately, there are many other such scams that were and are being perpetrated against seniors. In the 1990s, National Heritage Life Insurance Company defrauded elderly policyholders of $450 million. Prudential, one of the largest insurance companies in the country, scammed millions of seniors by tricking customers with existing life insurance policies into buying new policies that were more expensive and offered no additional benefits. United American agents, masquerading as representatives of federal agencies, pressured hundreds of seniors into buying insurance that cost more and provided less than the insurance they already had. In 2003, United American settled charges that it had defrauded senior citizens in the sale of Medicare policies. (more…)

In the American Association for Justice’s recent report entitled “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” there is a discussion of bed rails and the startling safety hazard they pose to nursing home residents. Many people believe bed rails to be a safety device meant to keep sick, drugged, confused seniors from falling out of beds in hospitals and nursing homes. Though these bed rails are presumably placed on the beds for the safety and security of seniors, the sad reality is that hundreds of seniors have been killed in connection with these bed rails.

Bed rail deaths are often the results of poor design, and nursing home residents are sometimes trapped between or under the rails themselves, or in gaps between the mattress’ edges and the bed frame. However, injuries are not only the result of poor design. Many times seniors are injured or killed by bed rails where their use was unnecessary. (more…)

When a beloved grandparent, parent, aunt, or uncle needs additional attention in the golden years of his or her life, you may decide to place him or her in a nursing home or other long-term care facility. You do so trusting that the facility will care for its residents and make sure that they are safe, happy, and well-cared for. According to a recent report from the American Association for Justice, entitled “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” instead of being well-cared for, seniors are too often ending up victims of nursing home neglect.

Stories of elder neglect are far too common in America’s nursing homes. The “Standing Up for Seniors” report discusses several cases of neglect in nursing homes: a nursing home resident who loses a leg after it becomes infested with maggots, an Alzheimer’s patient who gets trapped in a freezer and dies, and a Florida nursing home resident who suffers from multiple falls, multiple pressure sores, infections, dehydration and eventually death by starvation. The “Standing Up for Seniors” report also describes a 2004 investigation by the Detroit News that found that 14,000 nursing home residents died nationwide of malnutrition and dehydration over a four-year period! (more…)

Imagine that an insurance salesman has just persuaded you to sign up for long-term disability insurance. You’re relatively young now, but you are thinking ahead to the time when you will no longer be able to work and will perhaps need residential or nursing home care. Long-term disability insurance is a serious financial investment, but you decide to go for it because you don’t want to be a burden to your family. Year after year you pay your premiums on time and in full. After many years, maybe decades, of faithfully paying your premiums, the time comes for you to collect the benefits promised you by the insurance company those many years ago. You enter into a nursing home, confident that the insurance company will pay benefits as promised and you will be well-cared for. The insurance company maybe pays as promised for the first two years or so and then with a cursory form letter telling you that you have been “rehabilitated,” the insurance company denies your claim and cuts off your benefits!

According to a recent report from the American Association for Justice, entitled “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” this is a scenario facing thousands of seniors who have had their insurance benefits denied or cut by insurance companies who put profits over people. According to Mary Beth Senkewicz, a former senior executive at the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), “The bottom line is that insurance companies make money when they don’t pay claims. They’ll do anything to avoid paying, because if they wait long enough, they know the policyholders will die.” (more…)

Do you ever read all the fine print in the long consumer contracts you receive? If so, you’ve probably noticed a “mandatory arbitration” clause buried deep inside the contract. Most consumer contracts now have them — even contacts for nursing homes. By entering in a nursing facility, seniors or their families often have to agree that even if the nursing home harms, neglects, or abuses the senior in its care, the senior has no right to go to court to protest. It means the senior has no right to a judge, a jury, or a right of appeal. Also, the arbitrators do not have to follow the law, and there is no public review of the arbitrator’s decisions to make sure that he got it right. Additionally, forced arbitrations are often more expensive than taking a case to court.

A recent report from the American Association for Justice, entitled “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” studied the devastating effect of these forced arbitration clauses on nursing homes residents. The stories in the report are heartbreaking, and illustrate how unfair these clauses can be for seniors. (more…)

If you put your beloved parent, grandparent, aunt, or uncle into a nursing home, how would you feel if you found out that the nurses and doctors at the home tied them up to a bed or wheel chair? How outraged would you be if you knew that the people you’re paying to look after the well-being of your loved one were physically restraining them just so they would be “less of a bother?” According to a recent report from the American Association for Justice entitled, “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” it turns out that what is happening in nursing homes with increasing frequency is not that far off. Instead of using ropes and chains though, nursing homes are using chemical restraints on seniors — psychotropic drugs that sedate or control behaviors.

According to the Standing Up For Seniors Report, the use of chemical restraints has been on the rise in the last few years. This is very disturbing to note. In addition to the injustice of getting the drug equivalent of chains and a muzzle, the consequences of chemical restraints are dangerous and even deadly for seniors. The use of antipsychotic medication for chemical restraining has been linked to problems like falling, confusion, delirium, hospitalizations, and even death. (more…)

In the not too distant past, most nursing homes in this country were family-run affairs. The people running the nursing home lived and worked in the community, and the homes were places where seniors and their families could count on compassionate care. Nursing home neglect and abuse were unthinkable. According to a recent report by the American Association for Justice entitled, “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” this situation is changing drastically and senior abuse is on the rise. One of the main reasons is that an ever increasing number of America’s nursing homes are being run by corporations who are often more interested in profits than people. The result is that the corporations cut staffs, services, and standards of care to save some money.

The increasingly corporate nature of nursing homes is having some serious and disastrous effects on the seniors in the care of nursing homes. Many government agencies, non-profit watchdogs, and media organizations consistently find serious instances of nursing home abuse and neglect. By law nursing homes are required to provide their residents with the “highest practicable physical, mental and psychological well-being.” More specifically, they are required to provide food with sufficient nutritional standards, have adequate staff, prevent avoidable pressure sores, limit the use of chemical restraints, etc. Despite these clear regulatory mandates, the laws and regulations are not proving very effective to stop this growing tide of elder abuse and neglect. (more…)

According to a recent report from the American Association for Justice entitled, “Standing Up for Seniors: How the Civil Justice System Protects Elderly Americans,” nursing home abuse and neglect is increasingly becoming a reality for many of our nation’s seniors in nursing homes. There are laws meant to protect senior citizens and regulators assigned to ensure that these laws are being followed, so what is behind this increase in the numbers of seniors experiencing elder abuse or neglect?

According to the Standing Up for Seniors report, one of the main reasons lies in who now owns and operates these nursing homes. Today corporations have largely replaced the “mom and pop” owners of times past. In the “mom and pop” homes, owners lived in the community and the residents were often treated like family members. In contrast, corporate chains view their facilities as profit centers, not families. For these corporate chains, the financial interests of the shareholders are of paramount importance and profits are protected at all costs. Seniors living in these homes suffer from the consequences of this drive to be profitable. The consequences are unfortunately senior neglect and abuse. (more…)