California Elder Abuse Lawyer Blog

Elderly and infirm residents of nursing homes are at an increased risk for malnutrition and dehydration for a myriad of reasons, most significantly because they frequently cannot monitor their own intake of food and water.

A study done in 2000 by the Commonwealth Fund found that at least 1/3 of our nation's nursing home residents suffer from malnutrition and dehydration. The Commonwealth Fund is a private foundation that supports research to promote improvements in health care.

"The extent of malnutrition and dehydration in some American nursing homes is comparable to that found in many poor, developing countries where inadequate food intake in compounded by repeated infection." Jeanie Kayser-Jones, co-author of the study and professor of physiological nursing and medical anthropology in the School of Medicine at the University of California at San Francisco.

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A study published March 31, 2011 in the New England Journal of Medicine attempts to examine the relationship between Quality of Care Indicators in Nursing Homes and the risk of a lawsuit. The report concluded that nursing homes with more deficiencies and with more serious deficiencies had higher odds of being sued. The odds of being sued were lower in nursing homes with more nurse aide hours per resident days. These relationships make sense and further the goal that advocating for the rights of abused and neglected elders can and will deter misconduct.

However, the authors of the study conclude that the best-performing nursing homes are sued "only marginally less" than the worst-performing nursing homes, and then characterize the relationship between quality indicators and litigation as weak. This leaves the reader with the impression that the delivery of high quality care does NOT reduce the risk of being sued in any substantial way. This is a distressing conclusion, which has caused many to question the motives behind the study and the accuracy of the data.

The authors of the study reviewed data on tort claims brought against 5 of the largest nursing home chains in the United States for the period 1998-2006. During that period, 4,716 claims were filed against 1,465 nursing homes. On average, each nursing home was sued once every two years. A claim is defined as a written demand for compensation for injury. The data revealed that 61 percent of the claims resulted in a payment. The payments averaged $199,794 per claim. The most common injuries were those relating to falls and pressure sores.

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