Tuesday, March 29, 2011

More Residents Die at Alden Village North

The Chicago Tribune is reporting that five more death from allegedly substandard care have occurred at Alden Village North. This facility is already slated to be closed by State of Illinois' Department of Public Health. The article quotes Deborah Kennedy, of the watchdog group Equip for Equality as saying, "What we're seeing (at Alden Village North) is a culture within a nursing home that tolerated lackadaisical, substandard care for years."

An investigation by Equip for Equality found that in many instances poor care directly led to the untimely death of a resident and in other instances the poor care led to an earlier death than may have otherwise occurred. In any event, this lack of basic care as detailed by Equip for Equality is morally and legally wrong.

The Illinois Nursing Home Abuse and Neglect attorneys at Keating Law Offices, P.C. have handled numerous cases against various Alden facilities. The Illinois Nursing Home Care Act allows an adult resident of a nursing home or their family to pursue a civil lawsuit against a nursing home for any negligence by the facility or its staff that results in an injury or death. Under the Illinois Nursing Home Care Act, the nursing home is liable for damages from the injury or death.

The report details the death of one girl who was found to have a treatable infection. Despite the diagnosis of the infection, the girl was first not given appropriate antibiotics and then once the proper antibiotics were prescribed, there was an additional delay in the administering of the antibiotics. The girl later died as a consequence of the infection. This is an unfortunate example of a failure of the nursing staff and the girl's physician to work together as a team and to give the girl the appropriate medication she needed. According to the report, it was the failure of the nursing staff and her doctor that led to the girl's death.

In December of 2010, officials at Alden Village North claimed that they were making significant improvements to the facility. At that time 13 children had died at the facility. Keating Law Offices wrote on this matter on www.ILNursingHomeAttorney.com in a post that can be found by clicking here.

If you have any questions regarding this post or an issue involving Nursing Home Abuse and Neglect, please contact Illinois Nursing Home Attorney Mike Keating at 312-208-7702 or MKeating@KeatingLegal.com. All initial consultations are confidential and free.