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Be Careful When Choosing a Long-Term Care Facility

Nursing facilities must give the level of care they promise to their residents.  When you place your loved one in a long-term care facility, you have expectations don’t you.

  • They will get the medical care they need.
  • They will be safe.
  • They will have their physical needs taken care of.

The Commonwealth of PA, and the Federal Government agree with you.  There are rules that must be followed to take the proper care of long-term care facility’s residents.  For the laws that apply, please shoot me an email and I’ll send the citations over to you.

Getting the medical care a resident needs has as its starting place, assessment and creation of a care plan.  This is the document that is the framework for what will be done for your loved one.

Medicare.gov explains that a care plan includes basically:  an assessment of health within 14 days of arriving at the facility, then a health assessment each 90 days thereafter, and ongoing assessments to look for changes.  The nursing facility staff will then use these assessments to determine what services a person needs, and the staffing and resources to provide that care.

Extended Care Facilities do not always live up to the plans they make.  For any number of reasons, the Pennsylvania Department of Health and Human Services will do surveys of long-term facilities.  These are called surveys.

Holding the facilities to the abide the rules is tough.  In a recent visit of Frey Village in Dauphin County (Harrisburg Area), the facility was found to have violated more than 10 rules, in just one survey.  The surveys can be a good source of information, because without identifying a patient or the workers, it provides very clear details of how the violation occurred.

Before you send your loved one to a nursing home or other type of long term care facility in Pennsylvania, you should definitely read about the violations found in surveys on the Department of Health and Human Service’s website.

If it is too late, and your loved one has been neglected and suffered because of that neglect, then you may need our services.  Schmidt Kramer is a law firm that prosecutes nursing facility cases.  The workers in the facilities are often very nice people who are overworked and not given the proper resources to take care of your loved one.  We would be glad to speak with you, if you want to discuss your situation with a lawyer.  While we are attorneys physically located in the Harrisburg, Pennsylvania area, we are willing to review and take cases from across the state.