Cleveland Nursing Home Abuse And Neglect Lawyer

Your family members deserve the type of care they are promised when they enter a nursing home. When errors occur and they are injured, the nursing home must be held responsible.

At Goldstein & Goldstein, Attorneys at Law, we have successfully pursued nursing homes for abuse and neglect on behalf of our clients in Cleveland. These are upsetting, complex cases, and if you have questions, we have answers. Our team of attorneys is ready to listen to your story and build a plan with you to move forward.

Common Types Of Nursing Home Abuse

Nursing home abuse and neglect are, unfortunately, common. People across Ohio have struggled with the fallout from the dangerous behavior of nursing home personnel for a long time. Patients in nursing facilities are at risk for:

• Emotional abuse: Including verbal abuse and psychological abuse. These can be hard to detect but can lead to lasting mental trauma.
• Physical abuse: Including violence and sexual assault. These are physical dangers that can hospitalize a vulnerable person and, in some cases, become fatal.
• Falls: Falls often happen when residents who should be monitored are left unattended. These injuries are almost always preventable.
• Financial exploitation: Including fraud and theft. This is when nursing home personnel work to gain their charges’ trust to gain access to their finances.
• Neglect: This can include ignoring a person’s basic needs, such as regular changes of clothes and bathing, or failing to provide prescription medication on the proper schedule.

Patients suffering from dangerous, abusive or neglectful conditions undergo many changes. They may become withdrawn. Formerly warm, gregarious relatives can become quiet and distant. Levelheaded people may become emotional and inconsolable. These heartbreaking situations demand aggressive legal action.

Ohio Law And The Rights Your Loved One Was Promised

Ohio Revised Code § 3721.13 establishes a Patients’ Bill of Rights that every licensed nursing facility in the state is legally required to honor. Under that statute, residents are entitled to adequate and appropriate medical treatment and nursing care, a safe and clean living environment, and freedom from physical, verbal, mental and emotional abuse. Restraints, physical or chemical, may only be used to the minimum extent necessary to protect a resident from injury, must be authorized in writing by a physician, and cannot be used for punishment, staff incentive or convenience. When a facility violates those standards, it has broken Ohio law.

Chronic understaffing is one of the most direct ways those violations occur. Ohio Administrative Code Chapter 3701-17 sets minimum staffing and care standards for licensed facilities. When a home cuts corners on staff to reduce operating costs, residents go without timely monitoring, meals, hydration, repositioning and medication. Severe dehydration, dangerous weight loss, preventable falls and medication errors are the foreseeable outcomes of those institutional decisions.

Preventable falls are among the most common injuries we see. Ohio facilities are required to assess each resident’s fall risk and put individualized prevention plans in place. When a resident who needs assisted transfers is left unattended and falls, the failure typically traces back to understaffing or inadequate training. Medication errors follow the same pattern: when staff are stretched too thin, the wrong drug, the wrong dose or a missed scheduled medication can have serious consequences for a medically fragile resident.

Building The Case In Cuyahoga County

When we take on a nursing home neglect case, we move quickly to secure the evidence facilities would prefer to bury. We obtain shift logs, Ohio Department of Health inspection and audit reports, incident records and electronic medical records. That documentation is what builds corporate liability, not just staff negligence, in the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas.

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are answers to common questions about nursing home abuse and neglect cases:

How can I recognize nursing home abuse?

Watch for unexplained injuries, sudden behavioral changes, poor hygiene, unusual financial transactions, staff refusing to leave you alone with your loved one or your family member expressing fear around certain caregivers. These red flags signal potential abuse requiring immediate attention.

What does nursing home neglect look like?

Neglect typically appears as unattended medical needs, dehydration, malnutrition, untreated bedsores, unsanitary living conditions, medication errors, social isolation or unchanged clothing. These are likely signs that staff are not providing proper care despite their legal obligation to do so.

My loved one was restrained. Is that abuse?

While limited restraints may be medically necessary in specific documented situations, improper use, including chemical restraints (unnecessary sedatives), excessive physical restraints or restraints used for staff convenience rather than resident safety, constitutes abuse under Ohio law and federal regulations.

Who is legally able to file a claim?

Nursing home residents can file a claim themselves, or if they’re incapacitated, their legal guardian, power of attorney or family members (typically spouses, adult children or siblings) may file on their behalf, depending on specific circumstances and other Ohio law requirements.

Let Us Help You Today

Our team of attorneys is ready to take your call and help you through this. Contact us today by email or call us at 216-706-9664. We will speak with you in a free consultation and pursue the nursing facility for the damage they caused.