Without a hearing, our new congress wasted no time in trying to severely limit damages in nursing home abuse claims. A newly proposed law called the Protecting Access to Care Act of 2017 H.R. 1215, seeks to limit non-economic damages in all medical cases to $250K for everyone in the country.
What this means is that if your mom is humiliated by being violently raped in a nursing home, or your dad suffers a massive pressure ulcer from being neglected and left in his feces, the legislature has determined that $250K adequately balances the scales for their pain and suffering. This is wrong.
Of course, as with all laws of this type, the title of the law doesn’t really tell you what the law does. Also, these laws NEVER disclose the fact that they include nursing home abuse claims. They always hide that fact. After all, who would vote for a law entitled the “Protect Nursing Home Abusers Act?”
If you care about nursing home residents, tell your representative to reject this awful law. If you think it’s unacceptable to shield nursing home neglect and abuse from liability, then e-mail your senator or congressman and tell them to vote no to H.R. 1215.
You can read these excellent articles regarding this terrible law:
It’s easy to let congress know how you feel. You can find and contact your U.S. Representative here: http://www.house.gov/representatives/find/
Additionally, you can find and contact your U.S. Senator here: https://www.senate.gov/senators/contact/
