3 Strategies for Strengthening Your Nursing Home Abuse Claim

If your elderly loved one was neglected or abused by nursing home staff, it’s only natural to want justice. While filing a claim against the facility won’t erase what happened, it could at least help your family pick up the pieces in the aftermath, so you can arrange for better care.

To give your claim the best chance of yielding compensation, there are a number of strategies you can apply. Here are some of the most effective ways to bolster your claim, so you can pursue the maximum payout possible:

1. Preserve Anything That Could Be Relevant

From the moment you have reason to suspect neglect or abuse, start saving anything that might contribute to your future claim. This includes nursing logs, medical records, health insurance statements, testimony from other residents or their visitors, video footage, and photographs of any visible wounds. The more documentation you have, the stronger your claim will be.

2. Mitigate the Damages That You Can

Your family must take reasonable measures to mitigate damages. Put another way, you’re going to have to prove that every expense you account for when totaling your losses was reasonably necessary.

If the insurance adjuster thinks you could have avoided some of the damages you’re claiming, it opens the door for them to question your credibility in general. This, in turn, could threaten the entire grounds on which you build your case.

Let’s take a look at some of the most common ways to mitigate damages:

• Arranging for adequate medical care for the victim as soon as possible;
• Relocating your loved one to a comparable facility, as opposed to a much more luxurious one; and
• Only relying on hired help for tasks that you or other family members cannot do.

3. Enlist Help from a Seasoned Lawyer

Once the facility’s administrators learn of your suspicions, they will probably reach out and offer to conduct an internal investigation. No matter how helpful or sympathetic they seem, it’s important to remember that they don’t have your family’s best interests at heart. In fact, their ultimate goal of protecting the facility’s bottom line is in direct opposition with your own, which is securing a satisfactory payout on behalf of your loved one.

If you want help navigating the proceedings, the best option is hiring a seasoned nursing home abuse lawyer. Not only will they handle every aspect of your claim, but they’ll also advocate for you tirelessly along the way.

You can count on your legal team to correspond with the opposing party, investigate the circumstances surrounding the abuse, total the associated losses, and negotiate for a settlement. They will also prepare your case for court if the insurance adjuster proves uncooperative

Discuss Your Case with a Nursing Home Abuse Attorney in Stuart

Was your loved one mistreated by nursing home staff? To see if your family has grounds for legal action, turn to Donaldson & Weston.

Our resourceful team has secured several multimillion-dollar settlements and judgements on behalf of our valued clients. To set up a free case review with a nursing home abuse lawyer in Stuart, complete our Online Contact Formor call 772-266-5555.