Bed-Checks are made at regular intervals in drug rehab facilities to determine the location and condition of patients.
They are completed to make sure patients going through withdrawal aren’t experiencing health issues and haven’t managed to overdose.
Facilities with negligent staff members can fail to check on a patient often enough and allow a tragic fatality. Workers may be tempted to falsify their monitoring logs after a patient’s death, but a forensic investigation can uncover a facility’s liability.
The Importance of Bed Checks in a Rehab Facility
California drug rehab centers are responsible for the safety and care of the vulnerable patients they take in.
They can fail in these duties and on their own promises to families. Along with allowing drugs like Fentanyl into a “drug-free” environment, facilities can also fail patients by allowing them to remain unchecked.
Bed checks or Q-15 checks (every 15 minutes) are meant to guarantee a regular check on patients. To confirm they are in a safe place and that they are in good physical health. They should be done frequently and face-to-face every time.
But when these checks are skipped or delayed, patients have the opportunity to endure:
- Physical and sexual assault
- Self-harm
- Withdrawal health risks
- Overdose health risks
- Respiratory issues
- Brain damage risks (anoxic and hypoxic brain injuries)
- Fall risks
After a frightening accident, bed check logs or monitoring logs become prime evidence when blame for what happened is disputed. Unfortunately, the very records that can prove a patient was neglected can also contain errors, be falsified, or be destroyed.
Using Bed Check Documentation to Prove Negligence
Normal investigative methods can uncover powerful evidence to hold drug treatment center owners liable. But Forensic investigation uses science to show discrepancies on bed-check logs. It can track down computer records and even changes made to records. A written entry on a log sheet may even show a time when an employee wasn’t even working.
This and other evidence would be key in proving a facility was liable for a tragic facility death:
- Handwriting experts used to check over paper records
- Analysis of ink and pencil writing
- Computer experts checking over computer records and changes that may have been made (e.g., timestamps, User IDs)
- Information from an employee’s keycard showing they weren’t even on property when a bed check supposedly happened
- Employees’ work schedules
- Phone records that don’t match monitoring records
- Evidence of “pencil-whipping” when tasks are checked off without having been completed or writing a string of checks all at once
A California rehab facility wrongful death lawyer stands ready to help families when the evidence they need is locked behind facility doors. A skilled lawyer can demand the preservation of important evidence and bring in the right experts to hold rehab center owners fully accountable.
A Substance Use Disorder Patient Isn’t At Fault
A patient who suffers an overdose, a withdrawal complication, or manages to harm themselves isn’t at fault. Facility operators who promised to care for the patient and provide complete safety for their recovery are to blame.
Their lawyers may try to pin the blame on a patient. But the truth is, families can demand justice and support for the future.
They should receive help with funeral costs, with leftover medical bills, and in coping with their emotional trauma and any future distress. They are also right to ask for help in replacing the income a loved one may have provided to support a spouse and children, and other family members each month.
Contact Us if a California Rehab Facility Caused Your Loved One Harm.
Attorney Martin Gasparian offers a free, confidential consultation to families who lost a loved one at a California rehab facility.
Call us today or fill out a free case review form. If you need our help, we don’t charge your family anything upfront. We are only paid if we win the case for you. Then our fee comes out of the settlement that a negligent facility must provide.