Starting yesterday, new California regulations will require finger printing and a criminal background check for all new in-home caregivers before the caregivers can get paid. The law, enacted to help prevent fraud and elder abuse, is not being well received by many providers. Many counties have complained that the new…
The Chicago Tribune recently published a brief article called 5 Things to Know about Psychotropics, which I thought I would pass along to you. Here are the five things: Your rights: A nursing facility cannot administer a psychotropic drug without a physician’s order, which by law requires informed consent and…
If you or a loved one is being threatened by eviction from your assisted living facility (or residential care facility), it is important to know that the law is on your side. Under the California Code of Regulations, an assisted living resident can be eviction for only five reasons: 1.…
Governor Schwarzenegger has vetoed SB 303, a proposed law that would require doctors to inform residents about the dangers of psychotropic medications, and require nursing homes residents to give consent before such drugs can be given. According to the California Advocates for Nursing Home Reform (CANHR), the use of psychoactive…
Most plaintiff attorneys who represent elderly injury victims have a nightmare story in dealing with the Medicare Secondary Payer Act. The Act requires any Medicare beneficiary who is injured by a third-party, and then collects money from that third-party, to reimburse Medicare for the money it paid to treat the…
The Fallbrook Hospital District Skilled Nursing Facility was fined $90,000 by the California Department of Health in a case involving the fall and subsequent death of a resident. The citation was the most severe of its kind arising from inadequate care leading to the death of the resident. Although the…
At the end of last week, a Medicare rate adjustment that cuts $16 billion in nursing home funding went into effect. That cut, combined with state cuts, is creating conditions that are likely to put nursing homes in a state of crisis. In fact, the president of the American Health…
California should take heed. Illinois has been housing mentally ill felons with the elderly in state nursing homes and the results have not been pretty. An elderly woman was raped by an ex-convict, a frail man had his throat slashed, and in one home a wheelchair-bound man died of massive…
A report being released today by the Government Accountability Office finds that the federal program designed to identify and scrutinize the country’s worse nursing homes is missing many of the poor performers. The Centers for Medical and Medicaid Services has identified about 136 nursing homes nationwide that are considered “special…
In the 10 years since I took my first case against a nursing home for elder abuse, I have seen a growing number of homes going without liability insurance. While the uninsured problem used to be confined to the small mom-and-pop assisted living facilities with 6 to 12 beds, now…