Decubitus Ulcer: Patient Allowed To Sue Nursing Home

Legal Eagle Eye Newsletter for the Nursing Profession

November 1995

 Quick Summary: A patient admitted to an extended care facility for only ten days developed a decubitus ulcer due to inadequate nursing care. She then went to an acute-care hospital for nearly a month, and then to another extended care facility, still suffering from the decubitus ulcer which arose at the first facility. At the second extended care facility, according to the court, because of the negligence of its personnel, there was an aggravation of the condition of the ulcer which had first developed at the first extended care facility.

   The Louisiana Court of Appeals ruled that each extended care facility was negligent, the first for allowing the ulcer to develop, and the second for providing inadequate care which allowed an aggravation of the condition to occur. However, each facility was responsible only for the harm which it caused. The first extended care facility was responsible for paying damages only to compensate the patient for her condition as of the date when she left that facility, and not for the aggravation of her condition which occurred more than a month later, after she entered a second extended care facility. Littleton vs. Hospital, 657 So. 2d 527 (La. App., 1995).