Statement of Resident Rights

Residents and family should receive a copy of residents' rights at the time of admission.  This should be part of the admission packet given to resident and family. 

You, the resident, do not give up any rights when you enter a nursing facility.  The facility must encourage and assist you to fully exercise your rights.  Any violation of these rights is against the law.  It is against the law for any nursing facility employee to threaten, coerce, intimidate or retaliate against you for exercising your rights.

If anyone hurts you, threatens to hurt you, neglects your care, takes your property, or violates your dignity, you have the right to file a complaint with the facility administrator or with the Texas Department of Human Services by calling 1-800-458-9858.

You have a right to:

1. All care necessary for you to have the highest possible level of health;

2. Safe, decent, and clean conditions;

3. Be free from abuse and exploitation;

4. Be treated with courtesy, consideration, and respect;

5. Be free from discrimination based on age, race, religion, sex, nationality, or disability, and to practice your own religious beliefs;

6. Privacy, including privacy during visits and telephone calls;

7. Complain about the facility and to organize or participate in any program that presents residents' concerns to the administrator of the facility;

8. Have facility information about you maintained as confidential;

9. Retain the services of a physician of your choice, at your own expense or through a health care plan, and to have a physician explain to you, in language you understand, your complete medical condition; the recommended treatment, and the expected results of the treatment, including reasonably expected effects, side effects, and risks associated with psychoactive medications;

10. Participate in developing a plan of care, to refuse treatment, and to refuse to participate in experimental research;

11. A written statement or admission agreement describing the services provided by the facility and the related charges;

12. Manage your own finances or to delegate that responsibility to another person;

13. Access money and property you have deposited with the facility and to an accounting of your money and property that are deposited with the facility and of all financial transactions made with or on behalf of you;

14. Keep and use personal property, secure from theft or loss;

15. Not be relocated within the facility, except in accordance with nursing facility regulations;

16. Receive visitors;

17. Receive unopened mail and to receive assistance in reading or writing correspondence;

18. Participate in activities inside and outside the facility;

19. Wear your own clothes;

20. Discharge yourself from the facility unless you have been adjudicated mentally incompetent.

21. Not be discharged from the facility, except as provided in the nursing facility regulations;

22. Be free from any physical or chemical restraints imposed for the purposes of discipline or convenience and not required to treat your medical symptoms;

23. Receive information about prescribed psychoactive medication from the person who prescribes the medication or that person's designee, to have any psychoactive medications prescribed and administered in a responsible manner, as mandated by the Health and Safety Code, §242.505, and to refuse to consent to the prescription of psychoactive medications; and

24. Place an electronic monitoring device in your room that is owned and operated by you or provided by your guardian or legal representative.

Your rights may be restricted only to the extent necessary to protect you or another person from danger or harm or to protect a right of another resident, particularly those relating to privacy and confidentiality.