Nursing Home Abuse and Neglect Attorneys in Indiana and Illinois
When you or a loved one are a resident in a nursing home facility, you should be able to trust the staff, nurses, and doctors in that facility to keep you safe and properly attend to your needs. Unfortunately, nursing home residents are easy targets for neglect and abuse, which sometimes results in serious injury, and even death, to the resident.
Many nursing home residents are elderly or have mental or physical problems that make them vulnerable and more at risk for being a victim of nursing home abuse and neglect. And, if they cannot communicate the harms they have suffered themselves, you and your family cannot rely upon the nursing home to tell you that your loved one is suffering from an occurrence, or several, of abuse or neglect. But, an experienced attorney in the area of nursing home abuse and neglect can help.
Having a knowledgeable and experienced attorney in the area of nursing home abuse and neglect to gather the facts and review your case, and then help you pursue your nursing home claim is especially important in this area of law. In fact, nursing home cases often involve claims of medical malpractice as well, so having an experienced attorney in both of these complex areas of law is essential to the ultimate success of your case.
Each nursing home and medical malpractice case Allen Law Group handles has been carefully screened before the client and the injury attorney make their joint commitment to make a claim or file suit. The nursing home abuse/neglect and medical malpractice attorneys at Allen Law Group zealously pursue these cases, ready to take each one to a jury if necessary.
Indiana and Illinois Differ in How They Handle Claims of Nursing Home Abuse and Neglect
Due to tort reform, state laws have been passed to deal with instances of nursing home abuse and neglect, as well as medical error occurring in the nursing home, and to protect victims and their families when there has been an instance of abuse or neglect, or a failure of a physician or doctor (or other health care professional) to do their job properly. Indiana and Illinois law are not the same in these respects.
In Indiana, if the claim for abuse or neglect is related to the nursing home resident’s health care or professional services provided by a health care provider, then the Indiana Medical Malpractice Act may apply. However, if the claim sounds of ordinary negligence, it may be found to fall outside of the Medical Malpractice Act and can then be pursued as a general negligence claim, without being subject to the damage caps of the Medical Malpractice Act.
In Illinois, medical malpractice claims against individual caregivers, physicians, nurses, and healthcare providers that relate to care received while a resident is in a nursing home are still subject to the Illinois common law procedures for filing such claims. However, Illinois also has passed the Nursing Home Care Act, which created a new private cause of action against nursing home owners and licensees when a resident has been abused or neglected, or when any of the rights afforded to the residents under the Nursing Home Care Act have been violated. Claims under the Nursing Home Care Act are exempt from the requirement of submitting an affidavit in support of the claim, as is required with medical malpractice cases in Illinois. Common law punitive damages are also available under the Nursing Home Care Act.