Neglect in Nursing Home Leads to Wrongful Death Lawsuit

Posted on November 19, 2009 in Medical Malpractice,Nursing Homes,Our Blog,Patient Care,Patient Death

Sorry, but here’s another nightmare story about an elderly patient who suffered extreme neglect at the nursing home paid to care for her. Alice Train suffered from dementia and diabetes but was otherwise mobile when she entered the Evergreen Milton-Freewater Health and Rehabilitation Center. Her condition dangerously deteriorated in less than two months and, according to the lawsuit filed against the center, contributed to her death.

The lawsuit, filed by Train’s daughter, Barbara Dickerson, asks for $7.5 million in punitive damages and was filed in early 2007. The thing is, it keeps getting delayed, and currently it’s set to go to court in April of 2010. That’s more than three years after the lawsuit was initially filed. The latest delay was caused by the nursing home’s management company, which requested additional trial days.This forced the court to seek an appropriate court date to accommodate the lengthier trial, and this led to the April 2010 date.

I don’t want to get too into too many details of the neglect Train suffered at the nursing home. You can read about it in this article. Suffice it to say that the lawsuit contends her blood glucose levels were not properly monitored nor was her personal hygiene looked after in an appropriate manner. On visits, her daughter discovered sores on her mother’s body as well as evidence she hadn’t been bathed. After 49 days her daughter removed Train from the home, but Train never fully recovered, and she died on June 30, 2005 (she had been admitted to Evergreen on March 12, 2005).

This was not the first complaint about the Evergreen Milton-Freewater Health and Rehabilitation Center. The nursing home received poor grades on surveys, and the Oregon Department of Human Services nearly revoked the facility’s license.