Giant nursing home corporations continue to remain wildly profitable and wildly popular with investors, even as health and welfare advocates voice concerns about the profit motive behind the nation’s elder care and the risks of neglect and abuse.
Our Fort Lauderdale nursing home neglect lawyers and West Palm Beach elder abuse attorneys are concerned about the quality of care afforded by mega corporations behind most of the nation’s nursing homes.
As the Los Angeles Times recently reported, the biggest private equity deal of 2010 went down in December when a Long Beach investment trust announced it would pay $6.1 billion to buy the real estate assets of HCR ManorCare Inc., one of the nation’s nursing home giants.
ManorCare is the nation’s fourth-largest chain. Based in Toledo, Ohio, it has 338 homes in 30 states, including Florida. The Times reports there have been 40 buyouts of nursing homes in the last 4 years, totaling more than $20 billion. The enthusiasm of Wall Street is expected to continue with the aging of the baby boomers.
Together, the top-five chains control more than 200,000 of the nation’s nursing home beds. Nationwide, more than half of the country’s 17,000 nursing facilities are part of a large chain and two-thirds are operated as for-profit companies.
As we enter a new year, many families will be facing the need to select a home for an aging loved one. In other cases, visiting family members should remain vigilant in making sure a family member is receiving proper care.
A list of nursing homes on the watch list of the Florida Agency for Health Care Administration is available here.
Florida nursing home guide is available here.
If you have concerns about the conditions of a Florida nursing home, we encourage you to contact our office for a free and confidential consultation. It is up to each one of us to police the system and ensure the peace and dignity of our most vulnerable older residents. Contact Freeman & Mallard today at 1-800-529-2368.