Yes — with strategy. You have the right to file a complaint with the Virginia Department of Health (VDH), which licenses and inspects nursing homes, and with the Long-Term Care Ombudsman program. Substantiated complaints can result in deficiency citations, fines, directed plans of correction, or in egregious cases, loss of licensure.
The practical benefit for litigation: state inspection records, deficiency histories, and prior complaints are public records and often powerful evidence of a facility’s systemic failures — patterns that go beyond a single incident.
File complaints strategically, ideally with guidance from your attorney. Statements you make in a regulatory complaint can be used in litigation.