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Cherry Hill Nursing Home Abuse Lawyers: Resident-on-Resident Abuse
Cherry Hill nursing home abuse attorneys helping families throughout South Jersey
At Ferrara & Gable, our Cherry Hill nursing home abuse and neglect lawyers represent residents who have suffered harm from resident-on-resident abuse. We often file claims against the nursing home for failing to take preventive measures such as identifying possibly abusive residents, ensuring that the staff regularly interact with their residents, and limiting unsupervised interactions between residents who may have cognitive, physical, or emotional disorders.
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How can we help?
- How common is resident-on-resident abuse?
- When is resident-on-resident conduct considered abusive?
- How can South Jersey nursing homes prevent resident-on-resident abuse?
- How do your Cherry Hill nursing home abuse lawyers fight for abused residents?
- Do you have a nursing home resident-on-resident abuse lawyer near me?
How common is resident-on-resident abuse?
According to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the most common type of sexual abuse in nursing homes is resident-on-resident sexual abuse, driven by dementia. As the population ages, it’s likely this type of sexual abuse will increase. Stat, a health and medicine publication, states that the data on resident-to-resident abuse is hard to determine due to privacy concerns and the fact that due to their dementia, the victims of this type of nursing home abuse often fail to remember what happened and don’t even report the abuse.
Stat references a Cornell University 2016 study that concluded that almost one in five residents of nursing homes are involved in resident-on-resident incidents monthly. Stat defines resident-on-resident incidents as “Negative, aggressive, and intrusive verbal, physical, material, and sexual interactions between long-term care residents that in a community setting would likely be unwelcome and potentially cause physical or psychological distress or harm in the recipient.”
When is resident-on-resident conduct considered abusive?
The National Long-Term Care Ombudsman Resource Center categorizes resident-on-resident abuse as follows:
- Hostile interpersonal interactions. These incidents include arguments, accusations, sarcasm or jeering, disproportionate responses to normal interactions, and attempts at social control
- Invasion of privacy/personal integrity. This conduct includes invasions of personal space and room privacy.
- Roommate difficulties. These incidents include belligerent roommates and disagreements with roommates.
- Unprovoked actions. These acts include physical or verbal assaults without warning or cause.
- Inappropriate sexual behavior. These acts include unwanted sexual advances, exposure in the presence of others, and intentional nudity.
Examples of abusive resident-to-resident conduct include screaming, pushing, grabbing, kicking, stealing, exposure of body parts, verbal threats, harassment, cursing, throwing items, destruction of personal property, and other types of egregious conduct.
How can South Jersey nursing homes prevent resident-on-resident abuse?
Our Cherry Hill nursing home abuse lawyers are skilled at showing why residents abuse each other and what preventive and corrective actions nursing homes should have taken.
Some of the risk factors include:
- Understaffing and undertraining. Nursing homes should employer enough competent and well-trained personnel to help every resident in the nursing home stay safe.
- Overcrowding which can create a lot of tension and make it harder for the staff to provide individual care to each resident.
- Residents who have Alzheimer’s, dementia, or cognitive impairments.
- Residents with physical or emotional difficulties who may be abusive or the victims of abuse.
- Anything that increases the possibility of irritation among the residents of Cherry Hill nursing homes.
Some of the remedies include:
- Identifying which residents may abuse or endanger other residents.
- Preparing care plans for residents who might be abusive or be the victims of abuse
- Identifying why residents might be abusive – such as sadness, fear, pain, and other causes.
- Minimizing noise levels and other causes of anxiety and irritation.
- Hiring quality staff and training the staff to help and treat residents who may be abusive.
- Monitoring resident-on-resident incidents.
- Complying with federal and New Jersey nursing home regulations.
How do your Cherry Hill nursing home abuse lawyers fight for abused residents??
Victims of residence-on-residence nursing home abuse deserve to be compensated for their injuries when the nursing home is responsible. Common nursing home injuries due to other residents include broken bones, bruises, head trauma, spinal cord damage, burns, emotional trauma, and other types of injuries.
At Ferrara & Gable, our Cherry Hill resident-on-resident abuse lawyers file civil complaints against nursing homes that fail to properly protect their residents. We work with the resident’s physicians including gerontologists, psychologists, physical therapists, and other health care providers to verify what injuries your loved one has, how much pain they’re in, how their quality of life is affected, what treatments are necessary, and how much these treatments will cost.
We demand compensation from the nursing home for your loved one’s:
- Physical pain
- Emotional suffering including the trauma of a physical or sexual assault
- Medical bills
- Loss of function of any body part
- Loss of quality of life
We’re skilled at representing nursing home victims who have dementia and who have been abused by residents who have dementia.
Our Cherry Hill nursing home abuse lawyers also seek wrongful death damages if a close relative dies due to abuse or an assault by another resident.
Do you have a nursing home resident-on-resident abuse lawyer near me?
Ferrara & Gable’s meets nursing home residents and their families at our office which is located at 601 Longwood Avenue in Cherry Hill, NJ. There’s parking nearby. Public transportation, Route 38 also can be used to reach us. We do conduct phone and video consultations for clients who are immobile or too ill (physically or emotionally) to come to our office.
We’ll answer all your questions and explain how each phase of the claims process works.
Experienced counsel for South Jersey nursing home residents abused by their peers
One of the reasons seniors move into nursing homes is to enjoy the company of other residents. Tragically, too many residents live in fear of other residents or suffer harm from other residents – often due to the ravages of cognitive impairments. At Ferrara & Gable, our Cherry Hill resident-on-resident abuse lawyers have helped numerous seniors obtain just compensation when nursing homes fail to protect them. To discuss your rights or the rights of an elderly relative or friend, call us or complete our contact form today to schedule a free consultation.