Fighting the Good Fight - Glen Sturtevant Targets Nursing Homes During General Assembly Session
- 1 day ago
- 3 min read
Outside the Virginia State Capitol this week, a group of advocates made their voices heard — demanding that lawmakers take meaningful action on nursing home quality. Their message was urgent, personal, and, for many of them, long overdue. The demand from advocates came after the General Assembly’s recent session failed to address issues disrupting nursing home care and quality in Virginia.
Earlier this month and late last month, Sen. Glen Sturtevant (R-Chesterfield and Rawls Law Group Attorney) proposed legislation targeting nursing home financial oversight and physician-patient relations. Sen. Sturtevant proposed two separate bills, both of which target improvements in patient care, physician monitoring, and facility compliance. However, over the past month, the bill targeting nursing home financial oversight failed to advance; and the bill targeting physician-patient relations, also known as SB 555, became “watered down” from its original version as it passed through the General Assembly. In an interview with CBS 6, Glen Sturtevant said the following on the matter,
“There have been a lot of efforts to reform the nursing home system in the General Assembly. They oftentimes meet a lot of hurdles as a result of the industry and the lobby community who push back very hard and who have a lot of influence down here at the General Assembly,”
We know better than anyone that the problems plaguing nursing homes are not as simple as low staffing or unsanitary conditions. The overarching problems with the nursing home industry in Virginia are institutional greed and corruption. Proposed legislation such as SB 555, which target nursing home specific corruption, can easily be blocked because industry lobbyists and corporations would rather protect their profits than provide patients and healthcare workers with the necessary resources.
During Glen Sturtevant’s interview with CBS 6, he shared that the nursing home industry recommended he gut SB 555 of required monthly patient visits by physicians, sanctions or fines for physician and facility non-compliance, and eliminated the accountability scorecard. Elimination of the listed line items would inherently turn SB 555 into a proverbial old dog: all bark with no teeth. More importantly, the recommendations made by the nursing home industry blatantly disregard the concerns expressed by patients and healthcare workers.
The grueling reality of the Virginia nursing home industry is that facilities are understaffed and poorly managed by corporations. This puts a substantial burden on healthcare workers in Virginia nursing homes, specifically nurses. Such responsibility often results in healthcare workers being overworked and under-appreciated, all while being asked to complete tasks in poor working conditions. With limited resources and oversight, the unfortunate byproduct of these problems is that patients receive subpar, sometimes terrible, care at nursing home facilities.
Inside and outside the courtroom, our law firm works tirelessly to ensure the protection of patients. If you or a loved one has been injured by a healthcare provider at a long-term care facility or nursing home, you may have a medical malpractice claim. At Rawls Law Group, our goal is to provide patients and their families with the best legal service possible, and that starts with protecting patients even before we know them. Contact our office today and schedule a free consultation with our team.
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