As we grow older, our bodies become more susceptible to injuries in slip and fall accidents. Indeed, fall-related injuries are the leading cause of fatal and nonfatal injuries among seniors, according to a fact sheet from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. How can we take steps to ensure that elderly residents of Aurora do not become victims of slips, trips, and falls? According to a recent article in Forbes Magazine, there are some easy ways to ensure that your property is free of hazards that are particularly dangerous for older adults.

Structural And Environmental Changes Can Prevent Falls Among The Elderly

When a Chicago-area senior falls and gets hurt, it is likely that she will have more difficulty recovering from her injuries than a younger person. The article suggests that, for many seniors who get hurt in falls, a broken hip quickly leads to other serious problems. How can we make structural and environmental changes to help prevent these accidents from happening in the first place? Based on studies published in the Journal for the American Medical Association and Harvard Medical School, there are "some terrific, low-cost, low-tech ways to avoid dangerous falls."

What can we do to prevent a slip and fall accident? Some tips include but are not limited to the following:

Often, when we talk about nursing home abuse and nursing home negligence in Champaign, we think about incidents in which patients suffer physical injuries caused by physically abusive staff members or medication errors. In many cases where patients at nursing homes suffer from injuries, those harms result from nursing home neglect. In other words, it is not that someone at the facility actively committed a bad act, but rather that staff members did not do something they needed to do in order to prevent a patient from suffering an injury. For instance, bedsores, or pressure ulcers, commonly are linked to nursing home neglect and a facility's failure to properly attend to its patients.

Yet according to a recent report co-published by NPR and ProPublica, new technology has led to a new form of nursing home abuse. To be sure, social media has produced venues through which staff members at various nursing homes and assisted living facilities have been alleged to have perpetrated acts of emotional or psychological abuse. Now, according to the report, federal health regulators are stepping in to "crack down on nursing home employees who take demeaning photographs and videos of residents and post them on social media."

Nursing Home Abuse Involving Social Media Platforms

According to the report, there have been at least 47 instances of emotional or psychological abuse at nursing homes since 2012. Nursing home employees have been fired from their jobs and charged with criminal offenses for engaging in acts that serve to embarrass and humiliate residents. In short, staff workers have been cited for using Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, and other social media platforms to post "photos and videos of residents who were naked, covered in feces, or even deceased." There have also been reports of photographs and videos depicting physical abuse against patients.

Nursing home negligence in Champaign can result in serious personal injuries and successful personal injury lawsuits. But how often do we actually know about nursing home neglect? In other words, how can we be certain that Illinois seniors are receiving proper care in nursing homes and assisted living facilities in our state? Generally speaking, most of us rely upon state authorities to investigate when signs of nursing home abuse or neglect arise. However, according to a recent article from U.S. News & World Report, proposed legislation in Illinois aims to limit investigations into nursing home neglect.

What else do you need to know about this bill? And what can elderly Chicago residents do if they have sustained personal injuries as a result of nursing home negligence?

Bill Aims to Limit Investigations Following Anonymous Reports of Abuse

As the article explains, the recently proposed legislation would make it so that "authorities in Illinois would not investigate anonymous calls alleging abuse or neglect at nursing homes or assisted living facilities." Why would anyone be in favor of such a bill? In short, lawmakers who are in favor of it argue that it would "cut back on false accusations and harassment." However, elder safety advocates are very concerned about how the bill would impact seniors who have been victims of nursing home abuse and neglect in Chicago.

What does nursing home neglectlook like, and how does it differ from nursing home abuse? Unfortunately, incidents in which seniors in Champaign do not receive the care they need take place much too often. It can be difficult to know whether an elderly resident of a nursing home or assisted-living facility has been the victim of elder abuse or neglect, given that many older adults do fall and sustain injuries when no wrongdoing has occurred. We would like to focus on the distinction between elder abuse and elder neglect, pointing to specific signs and symptoms of neglect that might be missed by others in nursing homes or in situations where seniors live on their own. If you know what to look for, you might be able to prevent a serious elder neglect injury.

Distinguishing Between Abuse and Neglect

In general, nursing home abuse refers to situations in which "intentional or negligent acts by a caregiver or trusted individual... causes harm to a vulnerable elder," according to a fact sheet provided by the Association on Aging (AoA). In other words, most elder safety advocates consider nursing home neglect to be a form of elder abuse. The senior might not be subject to physically or emotionally abusive acts, but the lack of care—or negligence—may rise to the level of elder abuse.

In a nursing home setting, signs of neglect often look much different from symptoms of physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. Physical abuse often results in unexplained bruises, fractures, or cuts on the body, while emotional abuse tends to impact a senior's behavior. Whereas, nursing home neglect, has signs that point to a lack of attention to the elder's living situation. According to the AoA fact sheet, signs and symptoms of nursing home neglect include but are not limited to: