The 72-year-old patient was admitted to the hospital for treatment of heart failure and cancer. On admission her fall-risk assessment was 6. Two days later it rose to an 8. Policies at the facility called for fall-risk interventions to be initiated on any patient whose fall score was 6 or above. The evening of the third day of her hospitalization, the patients daughter told the nurse that her mother was trying to get out of bed.
The next morning, the patient was found unconscious on the bathroom floor. The prolonged lack of supplemental oxygen while lying on the floor resulted in the patient never regaining consciousness. She died later that same evening. The family filed a wrongful death lawsuit, alleging that the care provided the patient was negligent.
How do you think the court would decide in such a case? What professional responsibilities did the nurse have to the patient? What could the nurses have done to prevent liability in the case of this particular patient?
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