Has your loved one suffered injuries or emotional trauma due to abuse they suffered in a nursing facility? Your family deserves to hold the abusers accountable for the harm they’ve inflicted, and the experienced team with Chatham Gilder Howell Pittman wants to help. Contact us today for a free initial claim evaluation with a nursing home abuse attorney to discuss your legal options, and let’s stand up for justice together.
Why Choose Chatham Gilder Howell Pittman to Help Your Family After a Loved One Suffers Nursing Home Abuse?
If your loved one was abused while living in a nursing home, your family deserves justice and accountability for what’s been done. Hiring experienced legal counsel can give you the space you and your loved one need to recover while aggressively pursuing compensation and accountability. But how do you find the right attorneys for your claim?
For decades, families throughout North Mississippi have trusted the attorneys of Chatham Gilder Howell Pittman to guide them through challenging times because:
- We believe in the importance of human rights and strive to protect innocent people from unscrupulous parties who might try to take advantage of them.
- We prioritize our clients and strive to offer quality legal counsel and customer service.
- We treat everyone who comes to our firm with respect and compassion. You and your family will never feel like just another case number.
- Our attorneys recognize that going before a jury is often the best option for recovering the compensation and justice our clients deserve. While we will negotiate forcefully for a settlement whenever possible, we won’t hesitate to go to court or trial when necessary.
Understanding Nursing Home Abuse
Unfortunately, older adults who reside in nursing homes often have certain vulnerabilities that put them at risk of abuse from staff or other parties. Older adults may lack the physical strength to resist abuse, may feel embarrassment and shame about the abuse they’ve been subjected to, or may suffer from memory or cognitive decline that makes them unable to recognize when they’ve suffered abuse.
Nursing home abuse can take different forms, such as;
- Physical abuse: Physical nursing home abuse involves intentional, unwanted, offensive touching of nursing home residents or the intentional infliction of physical injury. Common examples of physical abuse include hitting, punching, kicking, pushing, pinching, or stomping a resident. Physical abuse may also involve physically restraining or sedating a resident without a medically necessary reason or denying food, water, or assistance with basic tasks like using the bathroom, bathing, changing clothes, or moving around.
- Verbal/emotional abuse: Verbal or emotional abuse can involve yelling at, berating, or belittling a nursing home resident. Abuse may also include threats of other forms of abuse, denying privileges, or isolating a resident from other residents or family.
- Sexual abuse: Sexual abuse involves any non-consensual penetration, touching, or display of a sexual nature. Common examples of sexual abuse can include sexual assault, sexual contact, baring one’s intimate parts to a resident, or baring a resident’s intimate parts for sexual gratification.
- Financial abuse: Financial abuse of nursing home residents can take various forms, such as stealing cash, checkbooks, credit cards, or valuables from a resident. Financial abuse may also involve manipulating a resident into providing the abuser with unwarranted financial benefits, such as gifts of money, placing the abuser on financial accounts, or changing estate planning documents to benefit the abuser.
Who Can You Hold Liable for Nursing Home Abuse?
Depending on the circumstances of the nursing abuse your loved one suffered, your family may have the right to hold several different parties liable. For example, if the abuse occurred at the hands of a nursing home staff member, your family may pursue a claim against that staffer as well as the nursing home owner or operator. Your case against the operator could involve a claim of vicarious liability for the staff member’s abuse or a claim of direct negligence for the nursing home’s negligent hiring or supervision of the abuser.
In some cases, third-party contractors who work in the nursing home, such as food service or maintenance/janitorial staff, may be responsible for the abuse. In that case, you may have claims against the contractor, the contractor’s employer, and potentially the nursing home if it negligently retained or supervised the contractor’s actions.
Financial Recovery Available in a Nursing Home Abuse Claim
If your loved one has suffered injuries due to nursing home abuse, your family may have a claim to recover compensation for your loved one’s financial and emotional losses, including for:
- Costs of medical treatment, physical rehabilitation, or mental health care
- Costs of relocating your loved one to another nursing home facility
- Physical pain and suffering experienced by your loved one
- Emotional trauma and distress suffered by your loved one, including reduced quality of life or life expectancy
How Long Do You Have to File a Nursing Home Abuse Claim?
Mississippi’s statute of limitations may apply different deadlines to a nursing home abuse claim. For many injury claims, the statute of limitations requires any lawsuit to be filed within three years of the injury. However, for intentionally inflicted injuries, the statute of limitations may give your family only one year to file a lawsuit. Failure to file by the appropriate deadline could cost your family your chance at justice. Don’t risk this possibility – contact the nursing home abuse attorneys of Chatham Gilder Howell Pittman as soon as possible to give yourself the best chance of filing a claim on time.
How Can an Attorney Help Your Family with a Nursing Home Abuse Case?
Your family deserves justice for the nursing home abuse your loved one suffered. Turn to an attorney from Chatham Gilder Howell Pittman who will work tirelessly to hold your loved one’s abuser accountable and pursue the financial compensation you deserve by:
- Investigating the abuse to recover evidence to build your family’s case
- Identifying your loved one’s abusers and other liable parties
- Documenting your loved one’s injuries and losses
- Filing your family’s claims and communicating with nursing home representatives, insurance adjusters, and defense attorneys
- Aggressively pursuing maximum compensation and justice for your loved one and family, even if that means taking your claims to court
Contact Us Today for a Free Case Review
At Chatham Gilder Howell Pittman, we strongly believe that no one should suffer abuse at the hands of those entrusted with their care. If your loved one suffered nursing home abuse, contact us today for a free, no-obligation consultation to discuss how our firm can fight for the financial recovery and justice they deserve
