Personal Care Homes

Introduction to Negligence in Personal Care Homes in Georgia

Negligence in personal care homes can have devastating consequences for residents who rely on these facilities for their daily needs and well-being. Personal care homes are meant to provide a safe and supportive environment for elderly or disabled individuals who may need assistance with activities of daily living. When negligence occurs, it can result in serious harm to residents’ physical, emotional, and psychological health. Understanding how negligence can harm patients in a personal care home is crucial for residents and their families.

Types of Negligence in Personal Care Homes

Negligence in personal care homes can take various forms, including failure to provide adequate supervision, assistance, and medical care. Common types of negligence include inadequate staffing levels leading to neglect of residents’ basic needs, failure to prevent and treat bedsores, medication errors, inadequate nutrition and hydration, and lack of fall prevention measures. Negligence can also manifest as emotional or psychological abuse, neglecting residents’ social and emotional well-being.

Physical Harm and Medical Complications

Negligence in personal care homes can lead to physical harm and medical complications for residents. For example, inadequate supervision and assistance can result in falls, fractures, or other injuries. Failure to provide timely medical attention can lead to untreated infections, exacerbation of chronic conditions, and complications that could have been prevented with proper care.

Emotional and Psychological Impact

Negligence can also harm residents emotionally and psychologically. Residents who experience neglect or abuse may suffer from anxiety, depression, social isolation, and a decline in their overall quality of life. Emotional harm can be just as devastating as physical harm and should not be overlooked.

Legal Recourse for Negligence in Personal Care Homes in Georgia

Residents who believe they or their loved ones have suffered harm due to negligence in a personal care home in Georgia have the right to pursue legal remedies. Our Atlanta law firm specializes in elder abuse and neglect cases, including those related to personal care homes. We are dedicated to advocating for the rights and well-being of residents and their families, helping them secure compensation for their injuries, medical expenses, and suffering. If you believe negligence has harmed you or a loved one in a personal care home in Georgia, contact us for a free consultation to explore your legal options and seek justice for your injuries or emotional distress.

No. That’s like asking, “I need brain surgery; can my primary care provider do it?” For brain surgery, you need a brain surgeon. For a medical malpractice case, you need a medical malpractice attorney. Davis Adams exclusively represents medical malpractice victims; that’s why you won’t find information about personal injury cases on this website. In contrast, most other firms that solicit medical malpractice clients primarily handle car wrecks and other personal injury cases. Just visit their websites, and you’ll see.

You have one opportunity to make the right decision for your Georgia medical malpractice case. We recommend asking every lawyer the following questions before making your choice:

Is your practice dedicated exclusively to medical malpractice cases?

If not, what percentage of your firm’s cases involve medical malpractice?

How many medical malpractice cases in Georgia have you successfully handled in the past 12 months?

Can you provide examples of Georgia medical malpractice cases similar to mine that you’ve successfully resolved?

Is your firm based in Georgia, with a long history of winning cases throughout the state?

When you’ve asked these questions and listened to the responses, you’ll likely discover that few law firms — other than Davis Adams — can provide good answers. We’d be honored to have the opportunity to speak with you.

Like all reputable medical malpractice law firms in Georgia, our firm operates on a contingency fee model. If we recover money for our clients, we earn a percentage. If we don’t recover any money, we’re paid nothing. Don’t be fooled by the flashy TV and billboard lawyers who advertise “No fee unless you win” as if they’re offering a special deal. They’re not – all reputable law firms offer the same contingency fee payment structure.

A variety of people may be able to file a lawsuit for negligence in a Georgia personal care home, including: 

A person injured by medical malpractice (or their representative) can file a medical malpractice lawsuit in Georgia to recover special damages (medical bills, lost wages, etc.) and general damages (commonly referred to as “pain and suffering”); 

The spouse of a person injured by medical malpractice can file a medical malpractice lawsuit in Georgia to recover for loss of consortium (essentially, harm to the marital relationship); 

The spouse, parents, or child of a person killed by medical malpractice can file a wrongful death medical malpractice lawsuit in Georgia to recover for the “full value of the life” of the decedent; and 

The estate representative for a person killed by medical malpractice can file a medical malpractice lawsuit in Georgia to recover for the pain and suffering the decedent experienced before death, medical bills and final expenses, and in some cases, the full value of the decedent’s life (on behalf of the decedent’s next of kin).

Every Georgia medical malpractice case involving personal care home negligence is different. Some take a few months, and some take a few years. As a general rule, we’ve traditionally advised our clients that their case will likely settle or go to trial within 24 months of our firm being hired. However, as the court system continues to recover from the Covid backlog, getting a case to trial now takes closer to 36 months.

We’d encourage you to run — don’t walk — away from any lawyer who tells you what your personal care home negligence case is “worth” before doing the work necessary to answer that question honestly. Before any lawyer can begin to value your case, they must engage you as a client, meet with you to hear and understand the story of what happened, order and analyze your medical records, hire expert witnesses, determine the venue for your case (the county in which the lawsuit would be filed), and confirm that amount of insurance coverage available from the defendant(s). Until those tasks are completed, no good lawyer will attempt to give you a reliable estimate as to what your case may be worth.

Because our firm is designed to be small and highly specialized, we’re selective in the cases we can take. At any given time, we’re typically litigating about 10 cases — and each year, we receive about 1700 inquiries from prospective clients. While we’d like to help more people, we’re not willing to sacrifice the quality of our work. Thus, we limit our engagements to those involving death or catastrophic harm, where we feel like we can make the greatest impact for the client.

The majority of Georgia medical malpractice cases are resolved through settlements prior to reaching trial, but it’s crucial to approach each case with the possibility of trial in mind from the very beginning. The reason is simple: we cannot predict which cases will ultimately go before a jury. Consequently, our medical malpractice lawyers litigate every case with a focus on trial preparation. This approach not only strengthens our client’s position during pre-trial settlement negotiations but also ensures that we are fully prepared to present our case to a jury should a negotiated resolution prove unattainable.

Yes, we routinely take complex cases around the country that require our advanced level of medical negligence expertise. To date, we’ve helped medical malpractice victims in 46 states.

Our marketing people tell us this should be the first FAQ, not the last. We disagree. You should have the opportunity to learn who we are and what we’re all about before we ask for your trust in handling your medical malpractice case. We hope the information you’ve already seen gives you a sense of what makes us different, and better.

Why do we think we’re better?

First, we’re laser-focused on one thing: helping medical malpractice victims in serious cases, all day, every day. That’s a commitment we’ve made. By contrast, most other lawyers claiming to handle medical malpractice cases spend the majority of their time working on matters other than medical malpractice — car and truck wrecks, etc. Our dedication to those injured by medical negligence sets us apart.

Second, we know Georgia; it’s home for us and always has been. We’ve earned our reputation as effective and respected Georgia medical malpractice attorneys among judges, court clerks, defense lawyers, risk managers, claims adjusters, and mediators over nearly two decades. Our deep local knowledge and long-standing relationships in the legal and medical communities are absolutely essential to getting the best results for our clients.

Finally, we’ve consistently achieved extraordinary results for victims of medical negligence in Atlanta and throughout Georgia. You can see what we’ve accomplished on the Case Results page of this website, and what our clients think of us on the Client Reviews page. The people who’ve hired and trusted us in their time of greatest need are glad they did. And that’s what matters most of all.

We’d encourage you to run — don’t walk — away from any lawyer who tells you what your prescription error case is “worth” before doing the work necessary to answer that question honestly. Before any lawyer can begin to value your case, they must engage you as a client, meet with you to hear and understand the story of what happened, order and analyze your medical records, hire expert witnesses, determine the venue for your case (the county in which the lawsuit would be filed), and confirm that amount of insurance coverage available from the defendant(s). Until those tasks are completed, no good lawyer will attempt to give you a reliable estimate as to what your case may be worth.