Elder Law

Nursing Home Beds May Be Unsafe

By Levin & Perconti

The New York Times recently published an expose that questions whether beds in nursing homes are safe for the patients within them. They discussed the death of one patient who found his neck entrapped between the mattress and the rail. The patient wrongfully died from asphyxiation. The family filed a nursing home lawsuit against the hospice organization, the manufacturer of the bed and the medical equipment vendor.

While bedrails are supposed to be safety devices, experts believe that they oftentimes create more problems than they solve. Rails decrease a patient?s risk of falling by 10 to 15 percent, yet they increase the risk of injury by about 20 percent. This happens when confused or demented patients who try to climb over the rails fall from a lower level and land on their knees or legs. These patients are then apt to fall further and strike their heads. However, the biggest danger is entrapment. Patients will get stuck within the rails or between the rail and the mattress. The FDA had tallied 480 deaths and 138 injuries from bedrail incidents. A person will roll into the slot next to the rail, which slides the mattress to the opposite side. The patient will drop to the gap and the mattress pressing on his/her chest will make it impossible to breathe.

The Chicago nursing home lawyers at Levin & Perconti recently reached a settlement in a nursing home bedrail entrapment death. The victim?s family was awarded $570,000 in the case. To read more about bedrail incidents, please click the link.

Full post as published by Illinois Nursing Home Abuse Blog on March 14, 2010 (boomark / email).