Nursing Home Accidents/Negligence Lawyers
When your family selects a nursing home to care for your loved one, you never expect that your family member will suffer a preventable injury. Nursing homes can and should be held accountable when that happens.
The nursing home negligence lawyers at Federman & Sherwood recognize that your family wants justice when your loved one has been hurt as a skilled nursing facility. We have a deep background in medical malpractice cases and recovered multiple large settlements in nursing home injury cases. We take a client-centered approach to all of our cases, putting your family at ease while we fight for you.
Federman & Sherwood is located at 10205 N Pennsylvania Ave, The Village, OK 73120, just south of the Penn Park neighborhood. Call us today at (800) 237-1277 to schedule a free initial consultation.
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Our clients appreciate our dedication and the lengths that we are willing to go to when representing them in a legal case. Client Bruno Muchanga writes: “Always ready to help and go [the] extra mile for your satisfaction! Thanks Federman & Sherwood.”
Oklahoma Nursing Homes Rank Low in Quality
The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services assigns star ratings to nursing homes nationwide. The average nursing home in Oklahoma receives only 2.7 stars out of a possible five. This places Oklahoma well into the bottom ten states nationwide. Slightly more than one out of every four nursing home beds in the state are located in facilities that receive four or five stars. This is indicative of the general poor state of care found in many Oklahoma nursing homes, which presents a significant health risk to your loved one who may be located there.
Nearly 5% of Oklahoma nursing home residents each year will suffer a fall that leads to serious injury. Almost 9% of Oklahoma nursing home residents will develop pressure ulcers in a given year, which is an entirely preventable injury. This is consistent with the fact that 224 out of the 283 nursing homes in Oklahoma have infection-related deficiencies on their federal inspection reports.
Common Causes of Nursing Home Injuries
Nursing home injuries can result from abuse or carelessness. In some cases, the two are closely related because neglect is a form of nursing home abuse. Besides abuse, your loved one can be injured in a nursing home in the following ways:
- Medical malpractice because the doctors and staff fail to provide the necessary treatment in a competent manner
- Fall accidents that occurred due to dangerous conditions or inadequate supervision
- Pressure ulcers, which are bed sores that develop because a nursing home resident may have been left in one position for too long
- Infections that developed because of poor hygiene or sanitary conditions
- Medication errors, such as administering the wrong dose or the wrong prescription
- Choking and aspiration injuries, either due to an unfitting diet or lack of supervision during mealtime
What to Do if Your Loved One Was Hurt in a Nursing Home?
There are two things that you must do quickly when your loved one has suffered a nursing home injury:
- If the injury was related to abuse or neglect, you should immediately report it to the nursing home, along with any specific allegations of abuse. Under Oklahoma law, the nursing home administrator must file a report with the state within 24 hours (they only have two hours to file the report if there was a crime or serious bodily injury involved).
- You should hire a nursing home accident attorney as soon as possible after the incident, or when you realize that your loved one was hurt due to negligence. You can expect the nursing home to try to cover their tracks and make it difficult for you to sue, and you must be prepared to deal with it.
Then, you must document the case to the fullest extent possible. If you had noticed any warning signs of nursing home negligence prior to the accident, you should relate them to your lawyer, so they can include them in the investigation.
Special Challenges Involved in Nursing Home Negligence Cases
Oftentimes, you begin a nursing home negligence case with an injury that you know should not have happened and not much else. Your loved one is often not able to give you their version of events, either because the injury was fatal or because they are not able to communicate. The nursing home is well aware of their potential liability, and they will go into full damage control mode. The nursing home may make it as difficult as possible for you to learn the true version of events.
Then, you may also have difficulties in proving that the nursing home’s negligence was responsible for your loved ones’ injury. They may argue that due to your loved ones medical condition, their actions did not cause the end result. Then, you would need your own expert witness testimony to establish causation.
“I recognize how important your loved one’s well-being is to your family. If a nursing home has put your loved one in jeopardy, I will do everything in my power to get justice.” Oklahoma nursing home negligence lawyer J.T. Sherman.
Contact an Oklahoma Nursing Home Negligence Law Firm
If the facility that was supposed to care for your loved one failed to live up to the duty of care that they owed, the nursing home negligence lawyers at Federman & Sherwood can demand accountability. Call us today at (800) 237-1277 or message us online to schedule a free initial consultation.