Memphis Nursing Home Abuse and Neglect Attorneys Discuss Lice and Scabies

By Thomas Greer | November 25, 2014

There are many ways in which nursing home residents can be neglected. From bedsores and inadequate supervision to being denied adequate food and water, the needs of nursing home residents can go unattended for quite some time before an injury, illness, or other incident reveals a pattern of neglect. Recently, the family of a resident of a Maryville nursing home called the Tennessee Department of Health because they were concerned that their elderly relative was being neglected.

In October, when the elderly woman was brought to a nearby hospital for treatment of pneumonia, hospital staff noticed that she had scabies and lice, and as such, they treated those conditions as well as the pneumonia. The woman’s family is concerned that the nursing home that they had entrusted with her care was unable to control the spread of scabies and lice within their facility, especially since one nursing home worker told them that scabies and lice have been present in that particular nursing home for quite some time.

Lice are parasites that feed on blood, and they live on human hosts. You may be familiar with lice if you have children who attend school because lice often spread quickly in a closed environment like a classroom. Nursing homes are also closed environments, and lice can spread quickly throughout a facility once one resident has them on their body. Scabies is a highly irritating rash which is caused by a mite that lives on the skin of a human host. The mites which cause scabies can move quickly throughout nursing homes and other closed environments, infecting multiple people within a short period of time.

Since it is well known that both lice and scabies thrive in a nursing home environment, nursing homes should have procedures in place to detect and treat them, and to eradicate them if they spread throughout the facility. An effective protocol might consists of measures like screening incoming residents for lice and scabies before they move into the facility, rashes or other skin problems should be reported, identified, and treated as soon as they are noticed, regular skin assessments should be conducted, and, upon the discovery of one case of lice or scabies, nursing home staff should screen all residents carefully to ensure whether other cases are present. Isolating cases of scabies and lice for treatment and sanitizing the laundry and surfaces that they have had contact with are also steps which must be followed in order to stop the spread of these contagious organisms.

The Memphis Nursing Home Neglect Attorneys of Bailey & Greer, PLLC want you to know that lice, scabies, and other infections can spread quickly throughout nursing homes. If the elderly residents of a nursing home are being neglected, residents who become infected are unlikely to receive the treatment that they need promptly, resulting in a great deal of suffering as the itching, rash, and other symptoms persist. If you suspect that your elderly relative is being neglected, report the neglect immediately. We are here to help you, so, please call our office as soon as you can, at 901-680-9777.

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