Nursing home abuse in North Carolina, Unfair Arbitration Clauses

This January 2010 article in the Blog of LegalTimes discusses the proposed legislation banning mandatory arbitration clauses that prevent people from suing nursing homes in a real court. Nursing home chains often present the families of prospective nursing home residents with an arbitration agreement at the time the family is filing out the mountain of paperwork necessary to get their loved one into a nursing home. In my experience, the family never understands what signing one of these agreements will mean in the event that their loved one is hurt or killed in a nursing home. The nursing homes ask for these to be signed for the simple reason that it benefits the nursing home in the event that there is a nursing home abuse or nursing home neglect case filed later. Arbitration agreements limit what the plaintiff in a nursing home case can get from the nursing home (documents, etc.), and sometimes even limit what a nursing home abuse or neglect victim may recover. If you are considering placing your loved one into a nursing home in North Carolina or elsewhere, talk to a nursing home lawyer about nursing home arbitration agreements first.