Nursing Home Neglect Incites Plans for Federal Staffing Minimums: Decades of evidence shows that insufficient staffing leads to a higher occurrence of nursing home neglect, poor care, and other evidence of nursing home malpractice.

The Biden Administration is formulating plans for federal staffing minimum requirements for American nursing homes, says the Washington Post, as evidence continues to show that nursing homes with low levels of nurse staffing have more frequent occurrences of resident complications that demonstrate nursing home malpractice.

According to the National Institutes of Health, since the 1980s it has been “common knowledge” within the nursing home industry that inadequate nursing staff within a nursing home has a negative impact both on the quality of care residents receive and the quality of life residents can have—deficiencies that add up to a classic definition of nursing home malpractice. But even with the 2001 release of a study by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) that found 4.1 hours of nursing care per resident per day (or one nurse per seven residents for day and evening shifts) was the minimum to avoid incidents of nursing home malpractice like allowing residents to fall or to develop bed sores, no requirement was implemented. And even with years of studies, inspections, and lawsuits since 2001 that have evidenced the link between low staffing and poor quality of care, a low percentage of American nursing homes—about 33 percent as of 2019, says the article—meet the 4.1 hours recommended by CMS.

The article included examples of enforcement actions and lawsuits filed against nursing homes to illustrate how insufficient staffing can result in incidents of nursing home malpractice. Among the cited examples of nursing home malpractice as a result of poor staffing included the following:

• A Washington state nursing home where there were four nurses for 110 residents; multiple residents received their insulin hours late, and others received insufficient wound care or were left untreated for pain.
• A Detroit nursing home where scheduled nurses called out for the weekend, leaving no nurses to distribute medications for pain, hypertension, blood clotting, and heart problems.
• A Chicago nursing home with between 2-4 caregivers for 72 residents, who often were left bedridden in their own urine and feces.
• The Brighton Rehabilitation and Wellness Center in Beaver, Pa., upon which Pennsylvania National Guard troops descended in the spring of 2020 during a COVID-19 outbreak that ranked among the worst in the nation. Allegations of staffing violations led to a subsequent federal investigation, resulting in criminal indictments against executives and administrators.

Nursing home neglect incites plans for federal staffing minimums, which are expected to come down in 2023. They will be formulated based on a new analysis of nursing home processes and will need to overcome nursing home lobbyists, who prevailed over a 2016 proposal for a national staffing minimum.

Defending Against Nursing Home Malpractice and Wrongful Death

As a nursing home malpractice and wrongful death attorney, Brian P. Murphy tirelessly fights to uphold the health and safety of residents in Philadelphia/PA and NJ nursing homes. You should feel confident that your loved one living in a Pennsylvania or New Jersey nursing home will receive the proper amount and quality of care he or she deserves. Years of experience as a wrongful death attorney fighting negligent Philadelphia/PA and NJ nursing homes has equipped Brian Murphy to successfully resolve numerous nursing home malpractice cases. Should you find yourself needing to contact a nursing home malpractice and wrongful death attorney, call Brian Murphy today to discuss your legal options.

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Cost-cutting Measures at Nursing Homes Leave Residents Suffering while Investors Profit:

Shielded by a complex corporate structure, investment companies can dodge accountability for lapses in care at private nursing homes.

There is a correlation between the poor—and sometimes dangerously poor—quality of care in privately-owned nursing homes and the cost-saving decisions made by private owners. But the many degrees of separation between the private investors who own the homes and the residents who feel the impact of their actions allow private investment companies to take profits without having to take responsibility.

Currently, about 70 percent of American nursing homes are owned by for-profit companies. Over the past several years, as the aging of baby boomers served to increase the demand for long term care, private investment companies jumped to acquire both large and small nursing home chains, moving quickly to reduce costs and boost profits, and frequently to resell facilities for significant gains. While these firms celebrate what they feel is a financial turnaround of a failing industry, the homes themselves are suffering from the very measures that make them profitable.

Studies reveal that homes acquired by large private investment companies on average fare worse than they had under their former ownership. Private nursing homes have scored worse than the national rates for preventable injuries such as bedsores, when, prior to private ownership, these homes matched national averages or even scored higher.

In particular, staffing cuts, made by nursing home managers under private investor ownership, have had a significant impact on the decline in quality of care in private homes. Staffing deficiencies—sometimes dropping to levels well beneath the minimum legal requirements—have been found by federal and state regulators to coincide not only with deficiencies in care (such as giving out the wrong medications or serving rotten food) but with incidents of resident death from injuries or accidental suffocation.

Cost-cutting measures at nursing homes cause failures in care which result in regulators levying fines and residents’ families seeking legal action. But the difficulty with privately-owned homes is reaching who is ultimately responsible. While publicly owned nursing homes must disclose who is in control of their facilities, privately-owned nursing home chains mask who’s in control behind convoluted corporate structures.  For example, a company that has purchased a chain of homes might lease all or some of them to another firm, which in turn could use several different corporations to manage these homes. Still other companies might be used to hire staff, do bookkeeping, and acquire supplies, so that responsibility across the chain of homes is difficult to discern.

Even when regulators discover and report deficiencies in these homes, this information is not easily accessible by those looking to weed out lower-quality homes when searching for a safe facility for an elderly loved one. According to a recent investigation by the New York Times, homes often manipulate data regarding staffing, inspection results, and quality of care in order to receive a high star rating from the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. The higher the star rating for a nursing home, the higher its profitability. But in terms of safety and quality, a home’s star rating may not mean much.

Fighting for the Rights of Your Loved One

It’s important to ensure that the Philadelphia/PA or NJ nursing home where your loved one lives avoids any poor care that results in nursing home neglect or abuse. Pennsylvania and New Jersey nursing homes are required to meet health and safety standards requirements and to ensure the physical, mental, and psycho/social well-being of their residents. Should you have concerns about the quality of care in a Pennsylvania or New Jersey nursing home, or if you suspect neglect, abuse, or fraud has occurred at the Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, or New Jersey nursing home where your loved one lives, please contact nursing home abuse attorney Brian P. Murphy to discover your legal rights and options.

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