What is Nursing Home Abuse Litigation?
By Joe Musso, Esq., Chief Training Officer
Smith Clinesmith, LLP
For almost 30 years I have been a “nursing home abuse litigator”. To understand what nursing home abuse litigation is let’s start by defining our terms:
Nursing Home Abuse:
If you ask random people on the street what “nursing home abuse” is, you might get dozens of different answers, but the vast majority of people will immediately think of “intentional harm”. They’ll point to staff members slapping, punching or maybe verbally or sexually assaulting a resident. Certainly, that would constitute abuse – but it is not the entire story. Nursing home abuse is defined by the regulations that govern nursing homes in America:
Abuse is the willful infliction of injury, unreasonable confinement, intimidation, or punishment with resulting physical harm, pain or mental anguish. Abuse also includes the deprivation by an individual, including a caretaker, of goods or services that are necessary to attain or maintain physical, mental, and psychosocial well-being. Instances of abuse of all residents, irrespective of any mental or physical condition, cause physical harm, pain or mental anguish. It includes verbal abuse, sexual abuse, physical abuse, and mental abuse including abuse facilitated or enabled through the use of technology. Willful, as used in this definition of abuse, means the individual must have acted deliberately, not that the individual must have intended to inflict injury or harm (42 CFR 483.5).
Note the highlighted and underlined language in this definition. When a nursing home, through its corporate ownership, makes a conscious (i.e. willful decision) to deprive a resident of the care and treatment that they know that resident needs, they are abusing that resident.
For example, a resident may report abuse or neglect to their family or even contact law enforcement on their behalf; because of this, a nursing facility starts depriving the resident of food. They are knowingly choosing to withhold basic needs, which is a form of abuse.
Now let’s define Litigation:
Litigation is the “act, process, or practice of resolving a dispute in a court of law” (Black’s Law Dictionary).
So what exactly do we do at Smith Clinesmith as “Nursing Home Abuse Litigators”? We sue nursing home owners who make conscious, willful decisions to understaff their facilities knowing that some of their residents won’t get the care they need and deserve. What these owners and their staff know is that every single resident they accept has something (or many somethings) they can’t do for themselves, that if left undone will lead to avoidable injury or even death. Nobody goes into a nursing home unless they need someone to help them. So if a resident can’t feed themselves, and staff fails to feed them – they could literally starve to death. If a resident can’t change their dirty diaper, and the staff fails to do it, the resident could get a fatal urinary tract infection. If a resident is unable to turn and reposition themselves in bed, and the staff fails to assist them to do so, they could develop horrific pressure wounds.
These nursing home chains market to local communities with phrases like “dignity”, “compassionate care”, “professional treatment” and “we treat you like family”. What they are selling is trust and peace of mind. They market to stressed family members who often are trying to balance work, family and life obligations while facing the reality that their loved one needs more assistance than they can reasonably provide by themselves. These nursing homes essentially say “trust us with your mom”, “trust us with your dad”, “trust us with your spouse”. They say “we know you can’t handle this burden but you are afraid and want your loved one well cared for. We’ll do it! – You can TRUST us!” But the statistics tell a very different story:
92% of nursing home providers reported a “significant” or “severe” workforce shortage (2023 LeadingAge National Workforce Survey).
In every state in America, nursing homes are promising communities that they can and will meet the needs of vulnerable loved ones knowing they don’t have enough staff to actually meet those needs.
At Smith Clinesmith, we hold nursing home ownership accountable for understaffing their facilities to make more money. We hold them accountable for putting profits above patients. We do this by filing lawsuits, conducting extensive discovery to prove our clients’ claims and if necessary, taking the case to trial to prove that a family’s loved one was abused and neglected.
If you are wondering whether you or your loved one might be the victim of abuse or neglect, these are the most common types of injuries and claims we are investigating:
Pressure injuries
Medication errors
Falls with serious injury
Malnutrition and dehydration
Infections
For a more detailed and comprehensive list, please visit Nursing Home Abuse Cases. Additionally, for more information regarding injuries please come back for Jacob Runyon’s post on Common Nursing Home Injuries (releasing on October 26, 2026).
