Jury Gives $4. Million In Punitive Damages Against Nursing Home For Inhumane Care Of 71 Year Old Incapacitated Woman
By: J. Hernandez
Submitted: 2010-08-29 14:48:30 | Word Count: 492
Attorneys who litigate medical malpractice lawsuits understand that those regarding nursing homes often involve horrific injuries resulting from a complete disregard for the health of the elderly and those who are otherwise defenseless and highly vulnerable to abuse and neglect. These claims many times further deal with strong emotional issues as family members not only feel a tremendous amount of pain for how their loved ones have been dealt with but in addition may also blame themselves for not recognizing the neglect and abuse long before.
For example, look at the following case. A female, seventy nine years old age, who had advanced Alzheimer's, was diabetic, and had a history of pressure sores, spent five years in the nursing home before the family realized how badly she was being neglected. During that time she was subjected to malnutrition and suffered from decubitus ulcers as she was left to lie on her bed which was drenched with her own feces and urine.
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Her family retained a lawyer. With the attorney's help the family filed a lawsuit naming the nursing home, the management companies, the nursing home owner, and both current and former administrators of the nursing home as defendants. As frequently happens in these cases, the defendants argued that the woman had been well cared for and had actually gotten better during the time she was in the nursing home.
The law firm that represented the woman and her family documented that the case went to trial where a jury decided not only that the care provided at the nursing home did not meet the standard of care but that it was willful and deliberate neglect. The jury's award for the woman and her family was apportioned two parts. The first portion was for $3,000,000 to cover the woman's medical expenses and for her pain and suffering. The second portion was for $4 million in punitive damages. The total sum the defendants were to pay came to $7,000,000.
Nursing homes in which patients are neglected and abused frequently do everything they can to keep this from family members. For example, family members might not be told that their loved one is suffering from significant and sometimes even life threatening pressure ulcers. In the event the patient cannot speak as was the situation with the woman in the matter examined above family members might not discover the neglect and abuse for a very long time. By the point at which family members discover them the bedsores are typically very advanced.
Author Resource:-
Joseph Hernandez is an Attorney accepting bed sore cases. To learn more about nursing home neglect and stage 4 bed sore cases visit the website
