Reducing Infection Rates in the Nursing Home
There are 4 nursing homes located near the City of California City. A wide range of clinical disabilities characterizes the older adult population in residential aged care facilities, such as skilled nursing facilities. Most of these elderly individuals are frail, have decreased functional status, suffer from multiple comorbidities, and have weakened immune systems, thereby placing them at great risk of infections and negative health outcomes. Los Angeles Nursing Home Abuse Lawyer, Yeroushalmi, and his team of attorneys and elder law experts believe that older adult residents in California City skilled nursing facilities should receive continuous, high quality care from nursing staff, to prevent avoidable injuries, infections, and diseases and to promote their overall health and wellbeing.
Research indicates that bed-bound residents are typically at higher risk of developing skin infections, while those suffering from urinary and fecal incontinence are at greater risk of developing urinary tract infections. Moreover, factors such as close living proximity and constant nurse-to-resident contact encourages the spread of bacteria among nursing home residents. Strong evidence shows that this condition, along with the back and forth nature between nursing homes and acute hospital facilities, facilitates a greater risk of infection among nursing home residents compared to older adults living in the community.
According to a recent article published in the journal Clinical Interventions in Aging, although it is recognized that the older adult population in skilled nursing facilities are extremely vulnerable to infections, successful infection prevention is still unable to be ensured. Infection prevention interventions are still commonly limited to infection surveillance efforts. Of particular concern is the widespread practice of prescribing antibiotics to nursing home residents, which can promote the development of antibiotic resistance. Substantial evidence has shown that broad-spectrum oral antibiotic medications, such as quinolones, are being increasingly prescribed among this vulnerable population, with as much as 75% of use identified to be inappropriate. Nursing home residents have been increasingly identified as a population especially at high risk of harboring multidrug-resistant organisms.
Therefore, nursing home staff must be extremely cautious when using antibiotics in this elderly population. Unfortunately, skilled nursing facilities are unlike acute care hospital settings in that the implementation of more specific infection control and antimicrobial stewardship practices cannot be ensured due to its limited resources.
Although there is a significant diversity of the incidence or prevalence rates recorded in the literature, urinary tract infections (UTIs), skin and soft tissue infections (such as pressure ulcers), and respiratory tract infections (RTIs) are the three most commonly recorded infections in long-term care facilities. Substantial research has shown that urinary tract and respiratory tract infections were also the most frequently identified causes for hospitalizations among older adults from long-term care facilities. Other than the fact that frequent resident referrals for hospitalization incur increased health care expenses, they were shown to significantly increase the risk of more negative clinical outcomes.
Skilled nursing facilities need their staff to have infectious disease expertise and training in infection management in order to decrease the risk of residents contracting avoidable health problems. If you or someone you love has experienced poor quality of care that resulted in worse health outcomes in a California City nursing facility, contact the lawyer, Ben Yeroushalmi, today for a free consultation. Mr. Yeroushalmi and his experienced team of attorneys and experts will work tirelessly on your case until a just resolution is obtained.