How Understaffing Impacts Nursing Home Abuse and Neglect Cases

So, understaffing is what you normally see when there’s abuse or neglect. What happens is, people need a high level of care when they’re actually in a skilled nursing facility or an RCFE. Usually, they need help with all of their activities of daily living, or ADLs. For instance, if they need help eating, they’re going to need assistance from a caregiver. If a person has dysphagia, for instance, they’ll have difficulty swallowing and they’ll need a trained caregiver to actually assist them.

Eating: there are certain methods they’re supposed to use. If they don’t have a caregiver who’s providing them with that assistance, they can essentially get aspiration pneumonia. That’s where they inhale some of the food into their lungs, which will lead to infections and can potentially lead to death. So, not having those staff members—not having those people there who actually provide those activities of daily living assistance—can lead to serious injuries or death.