Your loved one is confined to a wheelchair and living in a nursing home. You expect that she is safe and that nursing home staff will use reasonable care to keep her safe. Unfortunately, nursing home abuse and neglect can happen to anyone—including to someone who is in a wheelchair—and the consequences can be devastating.
How Wheelchair Accidents Happen in Nursing Homes
A serious wheelchair accident injury may occur if a person falls out of a wheelchair, a wheelchair tips over, or a person is left in the wheelchair too long without moving. These types of wheelchair accidents may result in serious injuries. These injuries include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Broken bones
- Lacerations and contusions
- Traumatic brain injuries
- Digits or limbs crushed by the wheelchair
- Amputations if fractures or crushed digits or limbs are too severe to heal
- Bedsores
While some incidents that occur in nursing homes are true accidents, many incidents are caused by the negligence of nursing home staff or negligent nursing home policies. Wheelchair accidents can result from:
- Lack of staff training on how to use wheelchairs safely
- Failing to check on nursing home residents often enough
- Leaving a person in a wheelchair too long or without the right padding to prevent a pressure sore
- Negligently transferring a nursing home resident from a wheelchair to a chair, bed, toilet, or other location or from another location to the wheelchair
- Failing to use wheel locks to stop the wheelchair from moving
- Failing to stop a wheelchair on even ground and in a safe place where it will not roll and where the person in the chair will not be bumped by other people
- Failing to adequately secure a person in a van or other motor vehicle
- Failing to make sure that wheelchairs are in good working condition and have appropriate safety features such as footrests to keep feet from getting caught in the wheels
- Failing to keep floors safe from hazards that could cause a wheelchair accident
It just takes one of these things for your loved one to be hurt and for the nursing home to be legally responsible for paying for your loved one’s injuries.
What Your Loved One May Recover After a Nursing Home Wheelchair Injury
If your loved one’s injury was caused by the negligence or abuse of nursing home staff, the nursing home may need to pay for your loved one’s damages. These damages may include compensation for all past and future expenses that come from the wheelchair accident including:
- Medical costs
- Out of pocket expenses
- Physical pain
- Emotional suffering
- Other damages
However, the nursing home is unlikely to do this voluntarily and the nursing home’s insurer is likely to fight back hard against paying your loved one’s damages. You can help your loved one by taking the right steps to protect her rights.
What to Do If Your Loved One Was Hurt in a Nursing Home Wheelchair Accident
Your loved one may be counting on you to take the next steps. You can start the process by contacting an experienced nursing home negligence lawyer who is committed to investigating what happened to your loved one and to protecting her rights.
At Gray & White Law, our legal team includes experienced nursing home injury attorneys and a staff nurse. Together, we will do everything we can to make sure your loved one’s rights are protected. Your loved one will not owe us any money until her claim is successfully settled. We don’t want financial concerns to prevent your loved one from getting the justice she deserves.
Please contact us at any time—24/7/365—via this website or by phone to schedule a free, no-obligation consultation with us and to learn more about your loved one’s rights and possible recovery. You can also begin learning more about protecting your loved one’s rights immediately by downloading a free copy of our book, Fighting Back Against Nursing Home Abuse: What Families Need to Know to Help Their Loved One.
Has Your Loved One Been Injured In A Nursing Home?
If you believe your loved one is being subjected to nursing home abuse you need to speak with an experienced Kentucky nursing home neglect attorney as soon as possible. Contact us online or call our office directly at 888.450.4456 to schedule a free consultation.
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