The nursing home industry—nationwide a multi-billion dollar industry—has found two mouthpieces here in Tennessee to hawk its "Kill Old People Cheap Bill," so dubbed by its opponents because it would essentially allow nursing homes to get away with murder if it's found that they were fully staffed at the time of the alleged misdeed.
Now I have nothing but respect for nurses and nurse aides in particular, the underpaid backbone of nursing homes, but I believe, in this case, the two authors of a Tennessean opinion piece, registered nurses Marilyn McClain and Jodi Williamson, are unsuspecting pawns of an industry that's pushing tort reform which has everything but the patient's best interests at heart.
I'll take a moment to point out some of the fallacies in their argument.
What we have here amounts to a chicken-and-the-egg argument. They lament the trial lawyers circling the Tennessee sky like buzzards. True, trial lawyers are opportunistic scavengers. But why are they here in Tennessee? They say they've alighted on our state because tort reform has run them out of others. But here are a couple of fun facts from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services: More than 50 percent of Tennessee nursing homes rate below average for overall quality of care. Sixty percent of nursing homes in this state are understaffed. If they're opportunistic, Tennessee nursing homes create opportunity.
