Nursing Home

The Impact of Nursing Home Neglect

When neglect has taken place in a nursing home, often the emotional damage is as lethal as the physical. Many elderly loved ones who have experienced abuse in nursing homes/assisted living facilities will face a lifetime of crippling emotional damages, including anxiety, depression and even the adoption of compulsive and strange behavior. Physical injuries may heal swiftly, or your loved one may suffer for years, depending on the severity of the injury.

Nursing home staff, the insurance companies and the companies that own or represent them may offer you a minor settlement when you notice neglect. These settlements may cover the cost of medical expenses or moving your loved one, but never take into account the emotional distress they have endured.​

What Type Of Damages Can Be Compensable?

Whether the nursing home abuse/elder abuse consists of a single incident or recurrent negligence which causes injury, the victim possesses a right to damages. Additionally, by seeking accountability, filing a lawsuit, and partnering with an expert nursing home abuse lawyer, residents and their families can safeguard other residents from suffering the same fate.

In many nursing home abuse cases, nursing homes may lose their certifications for failing to supply the required care, leading to a loss of funding.

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1. Damages for Medical Expenses:

The following types of damages may be compensable:

• Reasonable and necessary medical expenditures;

• Actual past expenses for medications, prosthetic devices, hospital, physician, nursing and laboratory fees, etc.;

• Anticipated future medical expenses;

• Pain and suffering from mental sufferings and physical injuries;

• Pain and suffering reasonably anticipated in the future;

• Harm from body conditions raised by prolonged immobilization;

• “Phantom pain” that may not be readily apparent to others;

• Harm from loss of sleep.

​2. Damages for Mental Suffering:

Monetary damages may be given for nursing home elders or their survivors, for mental pain, suffering, disfigurement, and impaired enjoyment of life. These damages may be awarded for both physical and mental sufferings. Mental suffering for which one may recover damages can include the following:

• Post-traumatic stress disorder;

• Anxiety about physical health and future well-being;

• Fear of the outcomes of an injury while awaiting assistance;

• Fear experienced after an injury about what else could have happened;

• Fear of the need for surgery in the future as a consequence of one’s injuries;

• Fear of high vulnerability to future injury;

• Fear experienced in the time period between realizing an incident likely to cause serious injury was going to happen and the time of occurrence;

​3. Damages for Disfigurement:

The nursing home residents are entitled to receive damages for disfigurement caused by nursing home staff. Disfigurement can include amputation, hair loss, scars, or any other injury that badly affects one’s appearance. The dignity of the elderly should be respected undoubtedly and preserved whenever possible, and if it is affected by a disfiguring injury, an adequate complaint should be made against the nursing home for monetary damages.

​4. Damages for Loss of Enjoyment of Life:

The loss of the enjoyment of life is clearly understood to mean one is deprived of the pleasures of living a full ordinary life. With a senior citizen, this could mean the ability to walk and exercise as one did prior to an injury, to play with one’s grandchildren, to make communication meaningfully with others, or to engage in pastimes one earlier enjoyed.

​5. Shortened Life Expectancy:

Courts usually do not consider shortened life expectancy as a separate injury, but it may be recognized in determining the severity of an injury, diminished earning capacity, mental suffering, and pain and suffering from the knowledge that one’s life will be decreased. Jurors are typically told to consider a plaintiff’s future damages based on ordinary life expectancy tables; however, due to high improvements in medical science and living conditions of people over the years, a lawyer might argue that life expectancy was or is actually higher than the standard tables would show.

​6.  Punitive Damages:

In Maryland, punitive damages are not available unless the plaintiff can show that the defendant acted with actual malice which is an extremely high burden.