Law Firm Resources & News

The Food and Drug Administration ordered drug makers yesterday to add warnings to antidepressant medications, saying the drugs increase the risk of suicidal thinking or behavior in some young adults. The drug labels, which have included similar warnings for adolescents and children since 2005, will now apply to people younger than 25. The expanded warnings,…

There is no evidence to support the much-publicized notion that the tort system amounts to a lottery for injured plaintiffs, as President Bush and others have long maintained, writes Philip G. Peters Jr. in the May edition of the Michigan Law Review. If anything, the system appears to be biased against them. In Peters’ 42-page…

A top Milan nursing home official has resigned a week after the state Department of Health suspended admissions of new patients at the facility. The Health Department has cited problems, including resident neglect, at Douglas Nursing Home. New admissions were suspended April 27 at the facility A complaint survey the Health Department conducted April 17…

A study conducted by a Johns Hopkins University researcher found that uninsured patients often pay much higher prices for hospital care. According to the study, uninsured patients are billed 2.5 times more than their counterparts under healthcare plans. Hospitals have faced criticism and lawsuits for alleged price gouging and aggressive collection procedures. Members of the…

I want to make those of you living in Virginia who read our Legal Medicine blog aware of a tremendous advocacy group – TLC4LTC. This charitable organization is committed to achieving quality care for nursing home residents in the Commonwealth of Virginia. Here is a brief summary of this great organization: Actions: TLC4LTC has developed…

In searching the web, I found a post recently on the Illinois Nursing Home Abuse Blog where a man in Louisiana recently filed a lawsuit alleging his mother was neglected during her stay at Heritage Manor in Houma, LA prior to her death on Christmas of 2004. The son alleges his mother received acceptable care…

San Francisco plans to spend about $600 million to replace the Laguna Honda Hospital and Rehabilitation Center, an effort that “bucks a tenuous trend across the country” to provide care to seniors in their homes or in assisted living facilities, the Wall Street Journal reported on May 7, 2007. “A debate has long raged over…

Prisoners assigned to a nursing home…. and they escape. What if it was worse? What it they had assaulted residents, taken their things – or left with residents? http://www.wcax.com/Global/story.asp?S=6466959&nav=menu183_2_4 I am in favor of prison work sites – but would anyone say a nursing home is an appropriate location?

A federal jury awarded $1.75 million last month to a woman who said her sister lost her dignity in the last days of her life because of unhygienic conditions and improper care at a Charleston, West Virginia nursing home. Tammy Rectenwald, 44, was in the late stages of multiple sclerosis and could no longer speak.…

Conditions at an East Peoria, Illinois nursing home changed dramatically for elderly residents when a number of younger residents with psychiatric problems and/or criminal histories were admitted to the East Peoria Gardens Healthcare Center. The Chicago Tribune reported the new residents wandered the hallways at night, shouting and pounding the walls with their heads and…

We have previously written about NCCNHR – the National Citizens’ Coalition for Nursing Home Reform (NCCNHR), formed because of public concern about substandard care in nursing homes. This tremendous advocacy organization has been busy this week testifying before the Senate Aging Committee on the need for increased staffing at all of America’s nursing homes. NCCNHR…