My Mom Had a Fall in Her Nursing Home and I Don't Know What To Do.

During the Holidays we get lots of calls from people with concerns about the care that their loved one is receiving in a nursing home. Many people travel for Thanksgiving and Christmas. This gives them the opportunity to see loved ones including their loved ones who are residents of a nursing home. Often, when people visit their loved ones in a nursing home, particular if they have not seen them in a while, they are concerned about their care and they call us with these concerns.

In this blog, we are going to talk about falls. Many, many nursing home residents suffer falls in their nursing home. When the family inquires about the fall, the staff at the nursing home often gives them a great deal of misinformation.

One of the things that nursing homes often tell families is that they are not permitted to use alarms because alarms are restraints. This is simply not true. If someone you love is in a nursing home and this is what the nursing home is telling you we strongly recommend that you move that person to a different nursing home.

If someone you love has been neglected or abused in a nursing home, please call us at The Dickson Firm at 1800 OHIO LAW. We would be happy to talk with you and help you in any way that we can.

It is true that nursing homes are not permitted to restrain their residents. The reason for this is that restraints more often than not create more problems than they solve. For example, if you have a resident who has the tendency to get up out of bed, it is not helpful nor particularly safe to put their bed rails up. When you put their bed rails up, they often just climb over the bed rail. If they climb over the bed rail, then they simply fall from a higher height. Further, we see residents who get tangled up in a bed rail and tragically sometimes strangle. Therefore, bed rails often do not make nursing home residents safe.

Likewise, if a resident is restrained with straps or some other device, they can likewise get tangled up and strangle. Sometimes these interventions are used in the hospital, However, most people are in the hospital for a short time. If someone is particularly agitated and particularly vulnerable because they just had surgery, then it might make sense for the hospital to restrain them. But in a nursing home setting where most people are there for a longer period of time, restraints are usually not helpful.

However, alarms are not restraints. The nursing homes often argue that the alarm startles the resident and makes them sit back down. This does not make the alarm a restraint. Further, this is a good thing. If someone you love is in a nursing home and they are not allowed to walk around by themselves, then the nursing home has to take precautions so they do not walk around by themselves. If they are at risk for falling when they walk by themselves, then walking by themselves is literally potentially fatal. Falls for an elderly resident often result in fractures and head injuries, both of which can absolutely be fatal. As a result, it is imperative to prevent nursing home residents, who are not able to walk around on their own safely, from walking around unattended.

Nursing homes are legally obligated to provide their residents with adequate supervision
to prevent accidents.

Nursing homes in Ohio are legally required to provide their residents with a safe
environment. This includes preventing falls.

If someone you love is in a nursing home, and they are at risk for falls, and it is not safe for them to walk around unattended, then the nursing home must have a specific care plan that is designed to prevent falls. If your loved one is at risk for falling out of bed, rather than put their bed rails up, the nursing home should put their bed in the lowest position and put a mat by the bed. That way if they happen to roll out of bed, they will not suffer an injury.

Further, there are a quantity of devices that can help the nursing home provide the resident with adequate supervision. I was reviewing a case the other day where the nursing home continued to clip the call light to the resident's clothing. The problem is that throughout the 6,000-page nursing home chart there was not a single instance where the resident ever used their call light over a period of years. The resident was demented. The resident was confused. The resident clearly did not have the ability to use their call light to call for help. She continually got out of bed. She clearly got up and walked on her own, despite the fact that it was not safe for her to get up and walk on her own. This resident suffered multiple falls and ultimately suffered a head injury that caused her death. If your resident suffers a fall in the nursing home, the nursing home needs to tell you what their plan is to prevent falls in the future.

There are alarms that are connected to a pressure pad that goes under the resident either sitting in a chair or laying in bed. That way when the resident begins to get up they take the pressure off the pad an alarm sounds which alerts the staff. There are clip alarms where the clip is attached to the resident's clothing and then attached to a string that goes to a magnet. If the resident starts to get up and pulls the magnet off the base the alarm sounds. There are motion detectors so that if the resident starts to get up in their room the staff
can be alerted.

Nursing Homes claim that alarms startle the resident and are therefore restraints. Many alarms do not startle the residents. Even if they do that does not make them restraints. Alarms can be connected to a pager that the nurses wear on their belt. They can be connected to a light that lights up over the resident's room. They can be connected to a voice recording. There are alarms where the resident's family member can record their voice encouraging the resident to sit back down.

One thing to ask the nursing home if they claim that they do not use alarms because they are restraints is, have they tried an alarm with your loved one? How do they know that the alarm will startle your loved one? It may not. There is absolutely no evidence that all alarms startle all nursing home residents. Many nursing homes have eliminated alarms simply because the use of alarms helps lawyers like me document their substandard care. If they are supposed to use an alarm and they do not use that alarm and a person has a fall they are clearly responsible. If they are using an alarm and the alarm goes off and nobody responds promptly then they are also responsible.

Alarms by themselves do not prevent falls. Alarms alert the staff that a resident who cannot walk safely on their own is starting to get up. What needs to happen is that the staff needs to respond to the resident immediately when they hear the alarm. They need to treat alarms as a matter of life and death because if a resident suffers a fall it is very likely that they can suffer a fatal injury. The owners and the operators of the nursing home need to make sure there are enough qualified staff to provide proper care to the residents including responding to fall alarms. The Nursing Home is required to provide all residents with adequate supervision to prevent accidents.

If someone you love is in a nursing home, and it is not safe for them to walk unattended, you must talk with the Director of Nursing or the Administrator and find out from them what the plan is to keep your loved one safe. If they do not have such a plan, if they cannot explain that plan, you should think seriously about moving your loved one to a safer nursing home. Many families express to us that it is challenging to move their loved one. The key is to find the better nursing home and then to work with that nursing home to move your loved one. The new nursing home will be motivated to help you move your loved one to their nursing home.

You can go to www.Medicare.gov and find a better nursing home in your area and then make arrangements to move your loved one.

Ohio Nursing Home Falls Often Result in Life Changing Consequences for Seniors

Every 11 seconds, an older person in the United States is treated in an emergency room for fall-related injuries.

When an adult falls, it often results in life changing consequences. Falls can lead to extending nursing home stays, permanent disability and even death.

The good news is that many falls can be prevented. The risk factor that is most likely to predict a future fall is a previous fall.

Falls can be caused by any number of things. Falls can be caused by vision problems. Falls can be caused by tripping on objects. Falls can be caused by weakness. Falls can be caused when an elderly person is knocked down by somebody else.

At The Dickson Firm, falls are one of the most common types of cases that handled by our Elder Law Attorneys. Our injury lawyers have handled hundreds of cases involving falls in nursing homes throughout the State of Ohio.

Nursing homes in Ohio have a duty, pursuant to the Ohio Nursing Home Residents Bill of Rights, which is a state law in Ohio, to provide their residents with a safe environment. This includes an environment where they address the needs of their residents who are at risk for falling. Many nursing home residents are at risk for falling.

When a resident is admitted to a nursing home, the nursing home is obligated to perform a comprehensive assessment of that resident to determine all of their needs. One of the things that they have to determine is if that person is at risk for falls. Some nursing home residents can walk safely on their own. They can get up and go to the bathroom on their own. They can walk to the dining room and have a meal on their own. They may need to be kept in the nursing home so they don't wander outside of the nursing home and get injured because they have dementia or some other challenge. But they are able to move about safely. Other nursing home residents are not able to get up on their own. They need assistance to get out of bed. However, there are a number of residents in the middle, who are strong enough to get up on their own, but not strong enough to walk safely on their own. They need supervision, and they need assistance.

As Ohio Nursing Home Lawyers we need to be familiar with the many state and federal laws and regulations that apply to the care of nursing home residents in a nursing home. Pursuant to the Code of Federal Regulations, which is a set of federal regulations that apply to all nursing homes in the United States, nursing homes are obligated to provide their residents with adequate supervision to prevent accidents. Nursing homes are also obligated to keep the resident environment as free of action hazards as is possible.

So, how do nursing homes provide their residents with adequate supervision?

Many residents use alarms. There are pressure pads that can go beneath a resident's chair or their bed so if the resident begins to get up, it sounds an alarm, and the staff can then attend to the resident and make sure that they are not getting up unattended. There are string alarms whereby a clip is placed on the resident's clothing, and the string goes to a magnet at the base of the alarm. If the resident begins to get up and pulls the magnet off its base, an alarm sounds, and the staff at the nursing home can attend to the resident. Nursing homes can make use of cameras in the rooms. They can make use of motion detectors.

Some nursing homes tell families who are admitting a loved one into their nursing home that fall alarms are restraints. This is completely untrue. While there may be some residents who might be startled by the sound of an alarm, alarms are not restraints. Further, there are many alarms that don't make an audible sound. There are alarms that set off a pager that a nurse can wear on her person. There are alarms that illuminate a light over the door of the resident's room. There are even alarms that could be programmed with the voice of one of the resident's loved ones telling that resident to sit down and call for help. There are many ways to implement alarms effectively without disturbing the residents.

At The Dickson Firm, it is our belief that many nursing homes have stopped using alarms because the use of alarms makes it easier to prove a nursing home case when somebody has fallen and suffered injury. If the resident was supposed to have an alarm and they did not have an alarm in place when they fall, then the nursing home would be liable for that fall. If the alarm does go off and the staff does not respond promptly, that can also be used against the nursing home in a lawsuit.

The fact remains that nursing homes are obligated to provide their residents with adequate supervision to prevent accidents. If you are admitting someone who you love into a nursing home and they are at risk for falls, you need to have a detailed discussion with the staff at the nursing home about what their plan is to keep your loved one safe.

What is their plan to give them adequate supervision? If they don't use alarms, how do they provide their residents with adequate supervision. We here at The Dickson Firm have never been provided with a reasonable response to that question.

We have never seen a strategy where a nursing home is actually able to provide adequate supervision to their residents without the use of alarms. Imagine a nursing home at 3:00 in the morning. There are 30 residents on one wing. There is one nurse and two aides on duty on that wing. How could those three people possibly know whether any of their 30 residents are up walking around their room? Imagine two of the aids are in one resident's room transferring that person to their wheelchair and ultimately to the commode using a Hoyer lift so that person can be toileted. Imagine the nurse is tending to a second resident. That leaves 28 residents unattended. It is simply not possible for the staff at a nursing home to have eyes on every single resident 24 hours a day. They need to come up with a system for adequate supervision. This system routinely involves some technology that enables the staff to keep an eye on the residents.

If your loved one is at risk for falls and the nursing home does not have an adequate strategy to prevent falls, do not leave your loved one in that nursing home. At The Dickson Firm our experienced nursing home lawyers have handled many cases where a person has suffered a fatal fall within hours of being admitted to the nursing home. We have handled many cases where the family member has told us that they specifically told the staff that their loved one was a fall risk and yet the nursing home did not put any interventions in place and the resident fell and suffered a serious injury.

In many cases, the resident is a new resident in the nursing home because they have suffered a fall. We see many cases where somebody suffers a fall at home, suffers an injury, goes to the hospital for treatment, often surgery, and then is sent to the nursing home for rehabilitation. As indicated above, the best indicator that somebody is a fall risk is if they have had a prior fall. The nursing home is obligated to provide each of their residents with an adequate strategy to prevent falls. If your loved one is at risk for falling out of bed, their bed should be placed in the lowest position. They can even place the mattress directly on the floor. And there should be a mat next to the bed.

Falls can be extremely harmful for elderly people. Falls can lead to fractures which can lead to immobility. Immobility can lead to pneumonia. Immobility can lead to bed sores. Falls themselves can be fatal. We have handled many, many cases where nursing home residents have fallen and either suffered a head injury which is ultimately fatal or even an orthopedic injury which is ultimately fatal. An incredibly high number of elderly people who suffer falls do not survive a year after that fall. As a result, fall prevention has to be a significant priority for any nursing home that cares about providing good care.

If someone you love has suffered an injury in a nursing home, please call us at The Dickson Firm at 1 (800) OHIO-LAW, as we would be happy to talk with you and help you in any way that we can.