Nursing Home Falls
Category: Personal Injury
Author: Georgina Tyburski
Posted: Friday - March 15, 2019
While anyone can suffer serious injuries or complications after a fall, older populations are especially at risk. Every year, millions of adults who are 65 or older suffer from serious injuries caused by falls. These include hip fractures, traumatic brain injury, and more.
Falls are especially dangerous for older individuals, and over 20,000 deaths are attributed to falls within this demographic. This number has been on the rise for years, and alarmingly, the CDC has reported that almost 2,000 of these incidents occur within nursing home facilities on a yearly basis.
Nursing Homes Neglect to Blame for Many Falls
When a nursing home resident suffers from a fall, he or she is likely to experience permanent disability, additional long-term complications, and an overall reduced quality of life. In many cases, falls can lead to death. Needless to say, preventing falls should always be a priority for any nursing home facility.
Various federal and independent organizations have conducted research into this matter, and they’ve concluded that falls in a nursing home are often caused by factors such as:
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Medical conditions such as disability, disease and dementia
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Medications
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The physical effects of aging
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Lack of nutrition/dehydration
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Imbalanced gait, weakened muscles, or other problems with strength
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Poorly lit, cluttered, and messy nursing home facilities
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Uneven or poorly maintained floors
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Unsafe or hard-to-manage clothing, shoes, etc.
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Poorly maintained furniture
While the effects of aging and illness cannot be easily mitigated, most of these falls squarely within areas that qualified nursing home staff should be trained to handle and work with. Nursing home staff needs to have the medical knowledge to address any potential medical or physical issues that could lead to falls, and they need to promote exercise to help keep residents healthy.
Likewise, it is critical for nursing home facilities to remain in order, clean, and well-maintained. Unfortunately, neglect can lead to conditions that further increase the likelihood of falls, and many nursing home facilities simply don’t have the resources or initiative to properly address these issues. Unfortunately, it’s our loved ones who are placed at serious risk and suffer the consequences.
Legal Nurse Consultants Weigh in With Expert Medical Assessments
Neglect or lack of funds is no excuse for placing nursing home residents at risk, and litigation towards many of these facilities is increasingly on the rise. As medical professionals, legal nurse consultants are part of these efforts to hold nursing home facilities accountable for their actions.
Their contributions to a given case can vary, but a legal nurse consultant is often tasked with examining a case and laying out the medical facts in detailed, in-depth reports. They are able to distill a complicated medical analysis into a streamlined report, make clear-cut connections between a patient’s conditions and the neglectful actions of other parties, compile crucial pieces of evidence, and more.
Learn more about the types of cases we handle and the services that we provide by reaching out to us at Legal Nurse Consultants USA. You can contact us at 877.211.7562 to connect with a medical professional today.
