When a family member is ill-equipped to care for a loved one who needs ample attention and medical support, they often turn to Manhattan nursing home facilities. These facilities will generally employ round the clock staff in order to properly care for the residents at all times and ensure that their needs are met. Often times, due to administration oversights or funding issues, employees of assisted living facilities are overworked and under staffed. When that occurs, the residents generally suffer in a big way.
Nursing home negligence is much more than physically abusing a resident or letting them fall. In the case of one man, it may have been lack of emergency preparation and short staffing that cost him his life. According to reports, a nursing home care resident caught fire when he was outside smoking. The man’s family claims that the nursing home was negligent given that the outside surveillance camera wasn’t watched by anyone and no workers were available to immediately help the resident.
A video of the incident shows that the man, actively on fire, went back into the building to receive assistance. An attorney, presumably for the family, asserts that it wasn’t until screams were heard that any workers helped. The resident, who was bound to a wheelchair, was doused with a fire extinguisher and then left outside for a few minutes without receiving any medical care. The family attorney also states that the facility’s workers panicked when the incident occurred. It reportedly took ten minutes after the fire began before the man, who died sometime later, received proper medical care by emergency workers who were called to the scene.
If you believe that your loved one has been mistreated at a nursing home facility, contact an attorney to discuss your rights under the law.
Source: NY Daily News, “Patient burns to death outside Chicago nursing home,” Doyle Murphy, Oct. 1, 2013