Could Your Loved One Die in a Fatal Nursing Home Accident?

The neglect and abuse of nursing home residents is far too common. If your elderly or disabled loved one is the victim of a fatal accident in an Indiana nursing home, you must speak immediately about your family’s rights with an Indianapolis nursing home abuse attorney.

When elderly and disabled persons in this state are no longer able to live independently, they may reside at one of more than six hundred Indiana nursing homes. Overwhelmingly, most of the nursing homes in this state provide superlative care. Others, however, do not.

Under Indiana law, whenever the death of a nursing home resident is the result of negligent or willful acts by a nursing home’s staff or management, the surviving family members may bring a wrongful death lawsuit with the assistance of an Indianapolis wrongful death attorney.

What Constitutes a Wrongful Death in a Nursing Home?

A wrongful death in a nursing home is a predictable – although preventable – result if the facility’s owners refuse to pay for adequate training and staffing. A nursing home’s owners have a right to earn profits, but profits can never be placed above the safety of nursing home residents.

The owners of Indiana nursing homes may be held liable for negligence and ordered to compensate the families of wrongful death victims. Nursing homes in this state, for example, must provide reasonable protection to their residents from the following conditions:

  1. malnutrition and dehydration
  2. falls and assaults
  3. bedsores and infections
  4. abuse and neglect
  5. unsanitary conditions

What is Indiana’s Adult Wrongful Death Act?

When a nursing home resident in this state dies due to neglect or abuse, winning justice may not be easy for the decedent’s family. Family members must prove that negligence – and not natural causes or the effects of old age – caused their relative’s death.

Indiana’s Adult Wrongful Death Act covers unmarried adults with no dependents, such as widows and widowers with grown children. It determines who may sue a nursing home for wrongful death, and in many cases, it limits the damages that family members may recover.

What Compensation is Available to Wrongful Death Survivors?

The Indiana Adult Wrongful Death Act covers both economic and noneconomic damages:

  1. Economic damages are the quantifiable damages that include medical expenses, hospital bills, and funeral and burial costs. To prove the amount of your economic damages, make and keep copies of all bills, receipts, and other documents related to the wrongful death.
  2. Noneconomic damages are based on the loss of love and companionship. It is difficult to place a dollar figure on these damages, so the Adult Wrongful Death Act limits or “caps” the noneconomic damages that loved ones may recover.

How Are Damages Capped in Nursing Home Wrongful Death Cases?

Noneconomic damages for the loss of love and companionship may only be recovered by the decedent’s parents or by the decedent’s nondependent children. Damages for the loss of love and companionship are capped at $300,000, without regard to the number of the decedent’s adult children, when those adult children are unmarried with no dependents.

There is no cap for children under age 20 (or under age 23 if enrolled in secondary education), and there is no cap for married adults or those with dependents. Your Indianapolis nursing home abuse lawyer will explain to you the laws and caps that apply to your own wrongful death case.

However, if your family’s damages exceed the cap amount, in some cases, you may recover up to another $1 million through the Indiana Patient’s Compensation Fund. If you qualify, your attorney will explain how the fund works and help you obtain that additional compensation.

When Should a Family Contact a Wrongful Death Lawyer?

When a nursing home is responsible for a patient’s wrongful death, it will probably try to hide its negligence or abuse. For the surviving family members, time is of the essence, but an Indianapolis nursing home abuse attorney will help you find and compile the evidence you need.

Your family’s nursing home abuse attorney will thoroughly investigate your loved one’s wrongful death by scrutinizing his or her medical records, emails among the nursing staff, surveillance video, and any previous incidents of neglect or abuse at the nursing home.

Indiana’s deadline (statute of limitations) for bringing a wrongful death claim against a nursing home is two years from the date of the death. However, you must not wait two years to contact an Indianapolis wrongful death attorney. Make the call to an attorney as quickly as possible.

If you do not contact an attorney promptly after your loved one’s death, witnesses may forget details, and the evidence in the case may be misplaced, lost, altered, or contaminated. Taking immediate action puts your family in the best position to prevail with a wrongful death lawsuit.

Are Wrongful Deaths in Nursing Homes Preventable?

Family members can do their part to prevent a loved one’s wrongful death in a nursing home. Family members should visit their loved one frequently and look for these signs of neglect or abuse:

  1. bed sores
  2. malnutrition or dehydration
  3. inadequate monitoring of residents
  4. medical negligence or malpractice

Cuts, bruises, abrupt weight losses, sudden mood swings, and abrupt, unexpected medical emergencies are also signs of nursing home neglect or abuse. Indiana encourages anyone who suspects nursing home exploitation, abuse, or neglect to report it immediately.

Who Should Handle Your Family’s Wrongful Death Claim?

Obviously, if your family loses a loved one to a wrongful death in a nursing home, a lawsuit will not relieve your suffering. Nevertheless, you must think of your family’s future, and you must consider taking action to hold guilty parties accountable.

An attorney with the Law Office of Deidra N. Haynes can help you meet the legal challenges and recover the compensation that your family needs and deserves.

In or near Indianapolis, the survivors of a wrongful death in a nursing home should schedule a legal consultation immediately by calling us at 317-785-1832. At the Law Office of Deidra N. Haynes, seeing justice served is our number one priority.