Nursing Home Responsible for Death Cause by Staff Negligence

I’m Katelyn Holub, an attorney focusing on personal injury law in northwest Indiana.

Welcome to Personal Injury Primer, where we break down the law into simple terms, provide legal tips, and discuss personal injury law topics.

Today’s question comes from a caller concerned about a family member who was in a nursing home. The caller learned that a nurse on staff at another nursing home was murdering patients. Apparently, the nurse when arrested claimed he was engaged in mercy killings.

Tragically situations like the caller described happen. Can a nursing home be held strictly liable for the misconduct of a nurse that they have hired?

Under the law, the answer would generally be no. Strict liability is a concept that generally does not apply to a hospital or nursing home setting.

If a nurse hired by a nursing home is acting within the course and scope of his or her employment and does something to harm one of the patients, as a result of negligence, the nursing home may be held liable for the nurse’s wrongful conduct.

In a situation described by the caller, the nurse was engaged in intentional criminal conduct. If an employee such as a nurse engages in intentional criminal conduct and that conduct could include battery as well as murder, may the employer be liable?

Often the answer will depend upon the facts of the individual case.

Assuming the nursing home failed to use reasonable care in interviewing and checking the credentials of the person who was hired who committed the criminal acts, then the nursing home very well could be found liable.

However, if the nursing home did everything reasonably and carefully to vet the employee and had no warning of any danger as a result of things that the nurse was doing while working at the nursing home, then there is a possibility that a nursing home will not be held liable.

Cases like that described by the caller are almost always very fact-intensive.

There was a newspaper article not long ago about a nurse who was linked to 15 deaths across several nursing homes. That nurse had left each nursing home when questions were asked about the death of a patient in the nurse’s care. Unfortunately, no definite wrongdoing was uncovered to establish that the nurse was responsible for the questioned death.

When that nurse moved to the next nursing home, the prior nursing home was not contacted by the new nursing home interviewing the nurse. Thus, the new employer was negligent in failing to learn about the suspicious conduct of the employee seeking employment.

When a patient is at a facility, such as a nursing home, the nursing home operators are charged under various state and federal statutes to manage the safety of those who are placed in their care. In doing so they must carefully select staff members who are licensed, and properly credentialed.

When selecting a nursing home for a relative or loved one it makes sense to carefully interview the staff and management of the facility to make sure that they are properly vetting those whom they hire to care for patients.

It’s also important to look at any complaints filed with the state about the nursing home.

Many times we have helped clients who found that had they simply done their homework they would have discovered that the nursing home they selected was under investigation for sanitary condition violations as well as staff members being inattentive to patients.

I hope you found this information helpful. If you are a victim of someone’s carelessness, substandard medical care, product defect, work injury, or another personal injury, please call (219) 736-9700 with your questions. You can also learn more about us by visiting our website at DavidHolubLaw.com – while there, make sure you request a copy of our book “Fighting for Truth.”