Here is the shocking truth: there is no mandatory minimum amount of insurance that is required to operate a nursing home, and some nursing homes literally have NO liability insurance.
Other nursing homes carry very little liability insurance, meaning they have insurance policies with very low limits. When a nursing home has insurance coverage at very low limits, they often have an eroding policy. An eroding policy is one where the limits of coverage drop with the costs of defense, including lawyer fees. This means that if the defense lawyer bills $200 for a court appearance, there is $200 less in coverage available to compensate the victims of poor nursing home care.
Beyond the difficulties created by inadequate insurance coverage and eroding policies, even nursing home facilities with adequate coverage face difficulties where there are multiple claims made by different families against the same nursing home, all of which must be paid from the coverage of a single insurance policy.
The insurance coverage is an important issue that our Chicago nursing home lawyers keep in mind when we form our case strategy.