Several cases asserting abuse in California nursing homes and assisted care facilities have recently raised important questions about the safety of elderly patients and residents.
As a personal injury law firm with an interest in helping the victims of elder abuse, we’ve been keeping an eye on these reports to understand how things might have gone wrong and allowed trusted caregivers to cause injury and even death to those in their care.
Fresno Facility Accused of Dumping Patients
In one case, a Fresno facility is being sued by a seventy-four-year-old former resident who says the nursing home dumped her outside her own home (from which she had earlier been removed because she was not capable of caring for herself).
Not only had she not been given the required thirty-day notice that she was being transferred, but the partially paralyzed stroke victim was then left on the curb after she got sick and soiled herself. That suit doesn’t end there. It also claims the facility allowed another patient to victimize her during her stay.
The state has already fined that facility $20,000 over this incident, which is one of three violations it was recently penalized for.
Oxnard Home Blamed for Death
The family of a woman who died at an Oxnard nursing home is suing that facility, claiming that neglect of the seventy-four-year-old patient, who had difficulty moving without help, led to her death.
Her family says she was admitted with mobility issues but that the home failed to monitor or treat her properly, leading to a series of new problems. The facility’s disregard for her health allegedly led to respiratory failure, pneumonia, the need for a feeding tube, and other complications and injuries.
At the time of her death, the suit alleges, she was undernourished and dehydrated, had terrible bed sores, and was in excruciating pain.
Inability to Provide Care an Issue
In yet another case, a Thousand Oaks facility has been accused of accepting a terminally ill patient, even though it was unable to provide the care she needed and was not licensed to deliver the appropriate treatment. The victim’s daughter says the eighty-eight-year-old cancer patient needed twenty-four-hour care and that she was admitted despite the facility’s shortcomings—purely for profit.
In this case and the others above, the accused businesses deny all the allegations.
Orange County Nursing Home Abuse Lawyer
Elder abuse takes many forms, and it’s often not as extreme as the neglect and inadequate care at issue in the cases we described in this post. Senior citizens are sometimes abused psychologically or emotionally by those who have been trusted to care for them, and many are financially abused by someone who gains their trust.
Regardless of the specific type of abuse, when someone takes advantage of a vulnerable elderly person, it’s important to hold the abuser accountable. Kohan & Bablove, Injury Attorneys has experience with nursing home abuse cases, and we offer every client a free consultation. Give us a call at 949.535.1341 or complete the form below to schedule an appointment.
