Illinois Nurse Indicted on Charges for Tampering With a Resident’s Medication
In December 2023, an Illinois nurse was indicted on federal charges in Chicago for tampering with a nursing home resident’s medication. The incident occurred in 2021, during which the nurse, Nickole Butler, removed liquid morphine from a patient’s medication and diluted it with another liquid, with full knowledge that the diluted liquid would be administered to the patient.
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Butler, who was a registered and licensed nurse employed by a skilled nursing facility, was charged with one count of tampering with a consumer product.
Seniors in nursing homes and patients in other skilled nursing facilities are particularly vulnerable to such types of abuse. While the nurse in this particular case was charged, many cases go unreported. It’s important to know what constitutes medical malpractice in the state of Illinois and how to deal with such incidents.
When Are Medication Errors Considered Medical Malpractice?
Knowingly diluting a patient’s medicine isn’t the only form of medical malpractice that can occur in a skilled nursing facility setting. You may be asking, “How do I know if I have a medical malpractice case?“
Ultimately, only a lawyer can determine the answer to that question. However, here are some types of medical malpractice you may come across if you have a relative or loved one in a nursing home.
Prescribing or Administering Incorrect Medications
One type of medical malpractice is either prescribing or administering the wrong medications.
An example of prescribing the wrong medication is prescribing a medication to a patient with a known allergy, such as prescribing penicillin to a patient with a penicillin allergy. Another example could be nursing home doctors prescribing lower doses of a medication or a cheaper, ineffective medication as a routine practice to cut costs and increase profits for the facility.
Similarly, if nurses in such facilities administer the wrong medication, that could also be considered malpractice. That’s true even if it wasn’t done with conscious intent; for example, if one medication was mistaken for another with a similar name or a similar-looking bottle.
Improperly Administering Medication
Improperly administering medication could include forgetting required doses, either through negligence or with conscious intent. It could also include improperly mixing medications that should not be administered together, administering lower doses than required, or diluting medication. The latter is what happened in the case of Nickole Butler.
Another example would be giving medication at the wrong time, such as a medication that is meant to be taken without food being administered after meals.
However, it could also include administering the correct dose of the correct medication, at the correct time, but via the wrong route. That could include a liquid medication meant to be taken orally, administered through an IV.
Not following proper protocols or safety procedures could also be considered improper administration of medication and medical malpractice. For example, when administering medication through an IV, nurses must take care to do it gently and avoid harm to the patient.
A nurse that roughly sticks a needle in a patient’s arm, resulting in bruising, or does not do his or her diligence to locate the vein, resulting in unnecessary insertions of the needle, could be considered negligent. Injecting the liquid medication too quickly could also lead to unnecessary bruising and pain.
Failure to Monitor Interactions and Side Effects
When administering a new medication or several medications at once, nursing home staff should monitor the patient’s reaction. Some medications have known side effects which may occur to a certain percentage of patients taking the medication. Patients may also have unknown and undiagnosed allergies that only come to light after the medication is taken for the first time.
Failure to monitor for such effects could be considered malpractice. If a patient reported experiencing a bad reaction to a medication, and the report was ignored by the medical professionals at the facility, he or she may be able to file a medical malpractice suit.
Administering Medications Without the Patient’s Consent
Psychotropic medications may not be given to a patient without his or her informed consent. Psychotropic medications include antidepressants and other medications that change a patient’s mental state. If the patient is not able to consent, his or her decision maker must consent. There are only limited exceptions, such as cases of emergency.
In addition, patients have the right to know the treatment they are receiving. A resident has the right to refuse any treatment (unless the refusal may result in harm to others) and be told the consequences of refusing such treatment.
If a patient refuses to receive a treatment or medication, the nursing home cannot administer it against the patient’s will, either by mixing it in the patient’s food without his or her knowledge or by physically forcing him or her to take it.
Doing Experimental Tests or Procedures
Experimental treatments can not be performed on a patient without his or her informed consent. Written consent must be given; verbal consent is not enough.
This applies to experimental research studies, experimental drugs, experimental vaccines, or any other type of experimental treatment. Even if a patient consents, the treatment must be monitored and reviewed by an institutional review board. A medical malpractice lawyer may help determine if experimental tests or procedures performed on your loved one violated his or her resident rights.
Ordering Unnecessary Tests or Procedures
Another form of medical malpractice is ordering unnecessary tests and procedures, even if these procedures are not considered experimental, but are merely unnecessary for the health and treatment of the patient.
There are several reasons a nursing care facility may order unnecessary tests and procedures. It is often driven by profit concerns.
Nursing care facilities can bill the residents or their insurance providers for tests and procedures they claim to be necessary, even if they were not. These tests and procedures could cause unnecessary pain or discomfort to the patient, as well as emotional distress.
Similarly, if a medication is not necessary, or if a doctor instructs the staff to stop the administration of the medication due to its ineffectiveness, the nursing home staff must not administer it.
Failure to Properly Diagnose or Treat Conditions
Medical malpractice could take the form of an improper, incorrect, or delayed diagnosis. For example, if a patient was displaying symptoms of a disease or condition, and these symptoms were ignored (and tests that should have been conducted were not), that can be considered malpractice.
Not thoroughly investigating symptoms or testing for diseases could also result in misattributing symptoms to the wrong disease. An incorrect diagnosis could lead to administering the wrong medications, which could result in unnecessary side effects while also failing to treat the underlying condition.
Failure to Administer Proper Care
Nursing home residents sometimes need assistance getting out of bed, bathing, and using the washroom. Failure to help a patient perform basic self-care tasks, either knowingly (as a punishment) or due to negligence, could result in health problems. For example, bedridden patients could develop bed sores if left in their beds for long periods.
What Should You Do If You Suspect Medical Malpractice?
If you suspect that a loved one has suffered from medical malpractice, contact a medical malpractice lawyer. A lawyer will advise you on the next steps to take. He or she will collect evidence and present the case in court, if necessary, to seek compensation and recover damages.
It’s important to know how to find a good medical malpractice lawyer. A good medical malpractice lawyer will have a proven track record in winning medical malpractice cases.
Insurance companies fear such lawyers, as they don’t want the cases to end up in court. Therefore, they are more likely to settle – and for a higher amount – out of court. That can help you save financial resources as well as time and stress.
Make sure the medical malpractice lawyer has experience dealing with nursing home cases. Medical malpractice is a large field, and lawyers experienced in dealing with cases in a nursing home setting will have a greater chance of successfully winning your case.
It’s important to hire a lawyer who works on a contingency basis. That means the lawyer doesn’t charge any upfront fees. Instead, he or she gets a percentage of the settlement or awarded damages.
That has several benefits. First, it ensures you don’t have to spend any money upfront. There is no risk to you. If you don’t win the case, you don’t have to pay anything. Most importantly, though, it ensures the lawyer is motivated to do his or her utmost to win the case and maximize the settlement amount. If you win, the lawyer wins.