Home health tops the list of nursing specialties with the highest number of medical malpractice claims, and each claim represents an expensive risk for the healthcare provider.
Malpractice claims involving medical nurses will average $301,031 in 2025, an increase of 39% from 2020, according to a report from the Nursing Services Organization (NSO).
According to the NSO, home health nursing comes with unique risks, including environmental hazards and workers being the sole health care providers on site without any supervision.
The report authors used data collected for this report from January 1, 2020 to December 31, 2024, which includes 466 closed professional liability claims.
Home health had the highest percentage of closed medical malpractice claims among nursing specialties, accounting for 21.7% of the total.
“But more importantly…the average total accrual increased significantly from $216,051 to $301,031, a total of 39.3%,” the report's authors wrote.
The report authors presented scenarios illustrating the risk of higher average home health insurance payments. In this article, a newly licensed registered nurse (RN) is hired by a home health agency to care for an infant who is dependent on a pediatric ventilator and requires constant observation. The infant became cyanotic, and the nurse attempted to render assistance and attempt resuscitation after the infant became unresponsive. Paramedics arrived and found that compressions were being applied improperly. The child subsequently died in the emergency department (ED).
“Nursing experts opined that the nurse did not act within the standard of care,” the report's authors wrote of this scenario. “The RN testified that she had no experience training patients on manual pediatric ventilators and had limited orientation upon hire to the home health agency.”
According to the scenario in the report, the lawsuit was settled for more than $475,000 on behalf of the insured nurse.
Early-career nurses are particularly at risk of being placed in clinical settings where they lack the necessary knowledge, experience, and clinical competencies.
To quell these concerns and claims, the report's authors recommend that home health agencies expand orientation and mentoring programs, simulation experiences, and nurse residency programs.
Providers have also found that providing more extensive training improves retention rates. This is important for an industry suffering from a talent shortage.
