Placing your loved one in a nursing facility means placing total trust in the staff to care for your loved one. A recent lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court shows that there are some instances in which that trust is violated.
The lawsuit is seeking compensation in the amount of $50,000 for the puzzling find in the stomach of a male patient. Adventist La Grange Memorial Hospital and Westchester Health and Rehabilitation Center are the two named defendants in the lawsuit.
The details of the lawsuit are rather troubling. The lawsuit alleges that the man was non-verbal, tube-fed, and bed-ridden. Despite those factors, there was a very puzzling find when the man was taken to the hospital from the nursing facility.
He was suffering from gastrointestinal symptoms when he was taken to the hospital. Surgery was performed on the man in June of 2012. In that procedure, a condom that was filled with a “hardened material” was discovered in his stomach. There big question here is how did a man who was bed-ridden and tube-fed end up with a filled condom in his stomach.
The complainant in the lawsuit has an idea about how the condom got there. The complainant believes that the man was sexually abused but isn’t sure where. The abuse could have occurred during any one of the man’s 14 visits to the hospital from January of 2010 through June of 2012. It could have been the result of nursing home abuse.
Almost eight months after his gastrointestinal surgery that produced puzzling results, the man died. His family members have opted to seek compensation for his death. While compensation won’t answer the question of how the condom ended up in their loved one, it might help to relieve financial pressures caused by the situation.
Source: McKnights.com, “Condom in resident’s stomach leads to charges against IL nursing home” Tim Mullaney, Jun. 09, 2014