Chapter 60 - § 60.7 • INFORMAL DISCOVERY AND INVESTIGATION

• Jurisdiction: Colorado

§ 60.7 • INFORMAL DISCOVERY AND INVESTIGATION

Because nursing homes are part of a heavily regulated industry, a great deal of informal discovery is available. On its website, the CDPHE maintains a deficiency and complaint history for all Colorado nursing homes for the previous three years. Although the publically available records do not contain resident names, the residents that form the basis of the deficiency reports are usually identified by the date of admission and admitting diagnoses, which make it possible to determine whether a given report corresponds to the resident at issue. The CDPHE website also includes a wealth of information concerning the ownership and operation of nursing homes, including current nursing home regulations.

Other federal and state information available through Freedom of Information Act and Colorado Open Records Act requests include Medicare costs reports, Medicare "look behind" surveys, ownership and licensure documents, and insurance documents.

The www.medicare.gov website contains extensive nursing home information, including "Nursing Home Compare," which lists nursing home staffing data, deficiency data, and comparative data for all Medicare certified nursing homes.

Facility employees are also an important source of informal discovery. However, ethics rules prohibit attorneys from ex parte contact with parties or with persons who are represented by an attorney in regard to a legal matter or who are management-level employees of the defendant company and are in a position to bind the company through their statements. Colo. RPC 4.2. Attorneys are similarly...