Case Study: The Supreme Court Ruling That Gave Nursing Home Residents Their Day in Court

How One Man's Fight Reached the Supreme Court

Most of the cases we handle never make it past a settlement table or, at most, a county courtroom. But one nursing home neglect case made it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, and the result is part of the legal foundation every case like ours now stands on.

A Decline No One Could Explain

In 2016, Gorgi Talevski, who had dementia, was admitted to a nursing home in Valparaiso, Indiana. Without his family's informed consent, the facility began chemically restraining him with six different psychotropic medications. His condition deteriorated quickly: he lost the ability to feed himself, and he lost the ability to speak English, though he retained his native Macedonian. It was only after the family brought in an outside neurologist, who tapered him off the medications, that his functioning improved.

Punished for Being a Resident With Dementia

The facility later claimed Mr. Talevski was harassing female residents and, on that basis, transferred him three separate times to a psychiatric hospital roughly 90 minutes away from his family. An administrative law judge found the transfer improper and ordered it reversed. The nursing home ignored that ruling and refused to readmit him.

The Lawsuit and the Question Before the Court

In 2019, Mr. Talevski's family sued the county-owned nursing home under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, the federal civil rights statute, arguing that the chemical restraints and improper transfers violated rights guaranteed to him by the Federal Nursing Home Reform Act (FNHRA). A district court dismissed the case. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals reversed that dismissal. The facility appealed to the Supreme Court, asking it to decide a question with consequences far beyond this one family: can residents privately sue to enforce rights created by federal spending legislation like the FNHRA at all, and if so, do these specific provisions count?

A 7–2 Win for Nursing Home Residents

On June 8, 2023, the Supreme Court answered yes to both questions. In a 7–2 decision written by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the Court held that the FNHRA's protections against unnecessary chemical restraints, and its limits on when a resident can be transferred or discharged, unambiguously create rights that residents can enforce directly under Section 1983.

Why This Case Matters for Every Family We Represent

Before this ruling, there was a real risk that nursing homes and their insurers could argue that residents had no direct right to sue over violations of federal nursing home protections at all, no matter how serious. Talevski closed that door. It confirmed that when a facility chemically restrains a resident without justification, or transfers and discharges them improperly, the resident and their family have a direct legal path to hold that facility accountable, not just a complaint to a regulator that may or may not act.

We bring this case up with clients not because every case looks like Mr. Talevski's, but because his case is the reason so many others can be brought at all.

Sources

Health and Hospital Corporation of Marion County, Indiana v. Talevski, 599 U.S. 166 (2023) — official opinion: https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/22pdf/21-806_2dp3.pdf

Wikipedia, "Health and Hospital Corporation of Marion County v. Talevski" — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_and_Hospital_Corporation_of_Marion_County_v._Talevski

Justia U.S. Supreme Court Center, case summary and opinion text — https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/599/21-806/