MIL fell out of bed in nursing home. We’re being told that rails are against state law in New York. Anyone know if that’s true?

Yup, illegal in most circumstances. Slippery slope by allowing any kind of restraint.

Rails are illegal in my state. I put rails on my mom’s bed at home because she had Parkinson’s disease and needed something to grab onto to get out of bed.

The lovely end of hospice care home that my mother died in had rails on the bed.

When I questioned how they were able to have rails with it being illegal they said it was because they only had four residents in the home so they didn’t have to abide by state regulations.

In Louisiana it depends on how many residents the home has. Under a certain number of residents, they don’t have to follow the state laws.

It can be confusing at times. Different people have different views on the subject.

I have been in nursing homes that broke the rules because of a lack of employees. They are shorthanded and they place restraints on patients in wheelchairs. Otherwise, the leaning patients would be falling onto the floor while watching television in the lounge area.

Yes rails are illegal. But there are things that can be done. Mats put on the floor and tge bed as far down as it will go.

This is a topic that comes up a lot on the forum

https://www.agingcare.com/search?term=bed+rails

I googled it and in some states they are not allowed in nursing homes because the patient gets trapped or entangled and cannot breathe. As the Greaton777 suggested there are mattresses that are concaved so that the patient cannot roll out.
This is from the FDA:
https://www.fda.gov/medical-devices/hospital-beds/guide-bed-safety-bed-rails-hospitals-nursing-homes-and-home-health-care-facts
Hope this helps.
In my state - California - half-rails are allowed not full rails.

In my state (MN) rails are considered a restraint and are illegal. A solution can be a concave mattress or just put her mattress on the floor. That's what the facility here did.