Stark & Stark Shareholder, David R. Cohen, Esq. spoke on the topic “Advocacy Track: Social Media and Technology” at the 2014 American Association for Justice Annual Convention in Baltimore, Maryland.
As a veteran myself, I loved this amazing story from England. Bernard Jordan is a 90 year-old WWII D-Day veteran. Unfortunately, he was originally unable to go to the ceremony commemorating the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landing because his request to take the tour attending was made too late. Undeterred, Mr. Jordan, who is cognitively intact and able to make daily trips into the town where he lives (and once was mayor), just got on a bus and went himself. He wore his war medals under his jacket.
I love this story because I find at times people are tempted to see the elderly in nursing homes as just a sick person with dementia at the end of their life. This story perfectly illustrates that nursing home residents are not the sum total of their medical records. That in many cases they lived amazing lives and accomplished great things – including participating in the largest amphibious assault in world history.
Cheers to Mr. Jordan. You can read the Today News article by clicking here.
When I first began doing long-term care litigation, I assumed one owner was responsible for the conduct of their nursing home and stood behind a facility. I’ve since learned that this is not normally the case.
Alzheimer’s can be a devastating illness that we see in many of our cases. Good news from the front against this disease is that a new blood test was developed that can accurately predict the development of the disease. While not yet fully available to the public, when it is it could have wide ranging possibilities.
A new study shows how problematic a sedentary lifestyle can be. The study found that adults over the age of 60 spend roughly 9 sedentary hours per day, and that “[e]very additional hour adults over age 60 spend sitting increases by 50% their risk of being disabled for activities of daily living such as bathing, dressing and walking”.
There is a great PBS interview of a former CEO who talks quite candidly about preventability of pressure ulcers (bedsores) and the misdirection of health care in America. Please click here to see that interview.
This story from Florida is both horrifying and yet not surprising. In a ManorCare facility in Florida, an elderly man died with second and third degree burns after being left out in the sun for almost 4 hours. It is another example of a stressed facility with too many residents to care for. It’s all about profit. In a drive for profits, staffing gets slashed because it’s the biggest expense. While most aides and nurses care about their residents, there is just not enough of workers to get the work done.
Even though lawsuits and litigation compromise only a miniscule fraction of the cost of health care – less than 1 percent – attorneys constantly get blamed for the rise in medical expenses.
In yet another chilling example of wasting taxpayer dollars and jeopardizing vulnerable nursing home residents, a Florida based owner has allegedly bilked public funds to line his own pockets.
There has been yet another of a stream of whistleblower cases involving Medicare and Medicaid fraud.
