Ohio Nursing Home Chain Grows With New Acquisitions
By Barry Zimmer on August 4th, 2016 in Long-Term Care
An Ohio nursing home lawyer helps seniors and their families to review nursing home references and nursing home admissions paperwork. The goal is to find the right nursing facility which prioritizes patient care. It is also important to ensure that no nursing home resident or family member inadvertently ends up waiving any patient rights by signing an admissions agreement without reading or understanding it.
Getting legal help from an Ohio nursing home lawyer has become increasingly important, as large nursing home chains and corporate conglomerates increasingly move into Ohio. When there are large nursing home corporations running homes, these big companies can sometimes focus primarily on profit at the expense of patient care.
Zimmer Law Firm helps clients to try to avoid situations where a home isn’t going to offer them the dignity and care they deserve. We also assist in taking action when a nursing home has failed its patients.
Give us a call today to talk with an Ohio nursing home lawyer about ways to protect yourself and your loved ones as an ever increasing number of nursing homes comes under the management of large corporate entities.
Ohio Nursing Home Chain Grows
Biz journals reported recently on an owner-operator of five nursing homes. The company which owns these five homes is growing by 40 percent in less than a one-year period. The owner-operator has an LLC and the LLC is a for-profit company which has been operating for 32 years.
The president of the company indicates that the company’s rapid expansion is possible, even amidst fluctuating rates of reimbursement from the government, because the nursing home is able to take advantage of economies of scale by operating many nursing home facilities. The goal is to model the nursing home expansion process on larger commercial nursing home operators, while still fulfilling a customer service niche that is similar to smaller nonprofit retirement communities.
Construction is expected late in the summer of 2016 on a new facility which will cost an estimated $15 million. The facility will be set on 7.5 acres and will have 75 skilled nursing beds as well as 35 assisted living apartments. The nursing home chain also acquired a 100-bed nursing home and rehabilitation center for $3.4 million when the prior owner retired.
The expansion of this nursing home is part of a larger trend for more facilities to be operated by for-profit companies which have multiple nursing homes under their control. Unfortunately, as nursing home chains grow larger, sometimes this creates problems because the homes are no longer managed as effectively. The focus can sometimes become the profitability of all of the facilities, rather than providing the highest quality care for patients.
What to Do When Problems Arise in a Nursing Home Setting
As nursing homes become larger, there may be more concerns about residents and their families about what to do if problems occur. Whenever problems arise in nursing homes, an Ohio nursing home lawyer should be consulted for assistance. An attorney can provide help in reporting abuse or neglect as well as in identifying whether the nursing home has been the subject of complaints or received citations from the state. An attorney can also provide help in taking legal action when abuse or neglect has caused harm to any nursing home patients.
Nursing home attorneys also do more than just respond when abuse or neglect has already occurred. An Ohio nursing home lawyer can help you to do advanced research on nursing homes in the Ohio area. As more and more companies acquire large numbers of nursing homes, just like this recent Ohio company is doing, there should be more data available on how these conglomerates or corporations run their facilities statewide and throughout the United States. This can help people to make more informed choices about where they, or their relatives, should get nursing home care when they need it.
You want to make plans in advance to select the right nursing home, rather than waiting until health deteriorates or until a health emergency necessitates nursing home care. If you are forced to choose a nursing home at the last minute, without having time to do research, you may not end up in a facility that is as high quality as the one you would have chosen.
Getting Help from an Ohio Nursing Home Lawyer
An Ohio nursing home lawyer offers you the invaluable assistance you need in protecting your rights and the rights of family members who become nursing home residents. Whether you live in a locally-owned and operated nursing care facility or one owned by a major conglomerate, you deserve to get the highest quality of care possible. To find out more about the ways in which Zimmer Law Firm can assist you in increasing the chances of getting good nursing home care, give us a call at 513.721.1513.