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Groups contend Tennessee legislation bolsters nursing home profits while ignoring patient rights

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) has joined the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) and other watchdog groups in opposing state legislation they say strips the civil rights of nursing home residents.

House Bill 4053 and Senate Bill 4075 only equips the nursing home industry to protect its profits while squelching the powers of the elderly to protect themselves legally against injustices, the groups told Clarksvilleonline.com.

Gloria Sweet-Love, NAACP State President, said the legislation is being backed by the billion-dollar nursing home industry. NAACP members have balked at the proposed legislation to General Assembly members.

Sweet-Love said, “Our parents and grandparents stood up for our rights and now we must stand up for theirs. The nursing home industry is demonstrating how far it will go to protect itself, even if it means stomping on the dignity of the people it should be helping.”

Clarksvilleonline.com reported in 2007 that nursing home violations and admission suspensions set record highs and were more than double those in 2006. State Health Department inspectors found 152 health and safety violations that put Tennessee nursing home residents in perilous health straits.

Rather than improving care, the industry seeks only to elevate profits while depriving the helpless of the right to seek justice, she said. The proposed legislation – co-sponsored by Sen. Jim Tracy (R-Shelbyville) and Rep. Randy Rinks (D-Savannah) – forces incoming nursing home residents to agree to caps on non-economic damages from lawsuits against the nursing facility.

“We just want to make sure nursing homes are not driven out of business through frivolous lawsuits," said State Sen. Bill Ketron (R-Murfreesboro).

The NAACP said lobbyists furtively named the legislation “Nursing Home Patient Protection Act of 2008” even though it shuns improving nursing care. Supposedly modeled after similar legislation in other states, this bill does not propose increases in staffing levels, training, inspections or other quality of care monitors, Clarksvilleonline.com reported

“The nursing home industry’s efforts to deny the rights of society’s most vulnerable human beings is self serving, profit-driven and despicable,” said Sweet-Love. The bill is currently working its way through the House and Senate Judiciary Committees.

But the Murfreesboro-based National Healthcare Corp. (NHC) backs the legislation, hoping it will eliminate excessive lawsuits against its nursing homes, reported the Daily News Journal in Murfreesboro.