Nursing Home Abuse

Emotionally it's so tough. All of us go through that stage in our lives where our folks are getting older and we'd like to think that we would be there for them as much as they were there for us. But you reach a point where there illness gets so bad that you know they need medical help and it's a heartbreaking decision to say, "I just to place them somewhere, I have to put them somewhere." You research and you think you've found the right home and you pray to God that the folks that are looking after them care as much about them as you do. And then you get that horrible phone call to find out that your mom or dad has been abused or beaten up and that just rips your guts up because a lot of folks take personal responsibility for that. They think, "God, I put them there, I trusted these people and they betrayed that trust." It's something that all of us can relate to and that's why they're so damn hard.

The thing about nursing home cases is that when I'm asked to pursue one for a client is getting the client past that guilt, getting them past the idea that somehow they're responsible for what happened. The idea that, "Gee if I just would have taken care of them myself and kept them in my house and been there for them, they wouldn't have suffered." You have to explain to clients that nursing homes are professional organizations and most of them are good places that do a wonderful job, but occasionally you do have the bad one. The ones that underpay their employees, that refuse to adhere to guidelines, and don't report when bad things happen. That's why it's such a contradiction in these cases, because you want to help the client so much because of the anger that you feel personally as an attorney. You are so angry that someone would hurt a mom or a dad that desperately needs help. And that's why I'm honored to do those cases.

We live in an age of medical malpractice reform and medical malpractice does also encompass nursing home cases. The frustration with that is that there are medical liability caps involved and it's a very detailed thing. The truth of the matter is that the recovery can be limited. But it certainly doesn't prevent us from aggressively going after these homes that quite frankly should be shut down. If I've been lucky enough in my career to do something I'm so proud of, these are the cases that mean so much to me personally. Too many tragedies go on that go unreported. If you happen to get that horrible call in the middle of the night, you can wake me up in the middle of the night and we can work through it together, because I know how tough that is.