Nurses have worked around the clock at hospitals to provide care for patients suffering from COVID-19. They’re working long hours in heavy personal protective equipment and devote all their attention and time to multiple patients. After going home exhausted, they get up the next day to do it all over again.

However, many nurses are leaving or thinking about leaving the profession. Many chalk this movement up to COVID fatigue. But what’s really driving nurses away is how hospitals are managing them. In a New York Times video, nurses tell their stories about how hospitals aren’t hiring enough of them to take care of patients to their best ability.

Every year, Best Lawyers® gathers industry intelligence on the top five percent of legal talent across 70 countries worldwide. Shrager & Sachs is proud to announce our own Robert L. Sachs, Jr. has been recognized in the United States in the areas of Medical Malpractice Law – Plaintiffs and Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs for 2021.

In total, Best Lawyers has researched legal information in over 200 metropolitan areas. As a result, the organization has recognized 67,543 lawyers from 16,545 law firms, in 148 different practice areas. All candidates come from private practices.

Rob Sachs, a managing partner at Shrager & Sachs in Philadelphia, has been a volunteer at Philadelphia VIP since 2005. VIP is an organization dedicated to providing free legal assistance to those who need it most. They help in all kinds of legal matters for individuals, families, businesses, and non-profits. VIP has hundreds of volunteer attorneys who will represent their clients and fight for their rights. These attorneys can range from highly experienced to new, or new to a particular kind of case. For those who are new, they can seek mentorship from VIP to help them hone their skills and gain more experience in that area of law. Sachs has made a positive impact from his volunteer work with VIP.

On November 14, 2018, the Pennsylvania Board of Examiners of Nursing Home Administrators voted to reduce the number of continuing education credit hours required every two years for licensed nursing home administrators. The Board voted seven to three to reduce the credit hours from 48 to 36.

We are pleased to announce that Attorney Rob Sachs of Shrager & Sachs has written an article titled, “Plaintiff’s Challenges to Pre-Suit, Binding Arbitrations in Nursing Homes,” which has been published by the Pennsylvania Association for Justice. In the article, he addresses two significant days for nursing home residents throughout the state of Pennsylvania, September 27 and 28.

On September 27th, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which administers over $1 trillion of federal reserves, issued final rules that will disallow binding, pre-dispute arbitration clauses in nursing facilities that are federally funded. Unfortunately, the next day, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court stated that it is bound by the US Supreme Court precedent and upheld the arbitration clause that will force separate arbitrations of survival actions that are bound by arbitration clauses and wrongful death action trials.

“There is no moral or economic reason to deny people who have been harmed the right to sue in court. But Republicans keep trying to do so.” This quote by our managing partner, Attorney Robert Sachs, Jr., shows our passion for protecting citizens’ rights to sue financial institutions. However, not everyone shares our convictions. The Trump administration is trying to shut down a rule that would allow people to join together to file class action lawsuits against banks and other financial institutions. If the Republicans succeed in blocking this rule, thousands of victims of fraud and financial abuse would have to settle in arbitration, which almost always benefits the banks.

Here’s What You Need to Know

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is trying to pass a rule that will allow citizens to file class action lawsuits against financial institutions. Without this rule, banks can force citizens to settle complaints in arbitration, which often works in the interests of the banks. Bringing individual lawsuits against financial corporations is often too costly, so the best way to hold banks responsible is through class action lawsuits.

Keith Noreika, a bank lawyer appointed by Trump, tried to stall the rule by saying more time was needed to determine if the rule threatened the stability of the nation’s banking system. The Consumer Financial Bureau refused. The facts showed that the rule would cost around $1 billion a year for the banking system, which makes more than $171 billion per year. Thus, the rule would not destabilize the nation’s financial institutions. It would only keep them more accountable.

The National Association of Distinguished Counsel (NADC) is one of the leading organizations in the country that recognizes and rewards legal professionals that continually and consistently exemplify what it means to be at the top of their class. This group uses high scrutiny and in-depth research to only pick out who it believes to be the best of the best. By the time it is finished choosing its annual members, less than 1% of all actively practicing lawyers in the country will receive an invitation to the Nation’s Top One Percent by NADC.

It is with much pride that our team at Shrager & Sachs in Philadelphia can announce that Attorney Robert Sachs has been selected to the 2017 list of the National Association of Distinguished Counsel Nation’s Top One Percent. In order to have been selected, Mr. Sachs must have met and exceeded the difficult standards set forth by the NADC, including passing the analyses of blue ribbon panelists and judicial review groups. (Click here to visit the official NADC website and learn more about this great association.)

Shrager & Sachs is pleased to announce that Managing Partner Rob Sachs has been elected to the Board of Directors of The Lawyers’ Club of Philadelphia. A prestigious honor that highlights Attorney Sachs’ positive reputation throughout the local and legal communities, selection to the Lawyers’ Club Board of Directors is a distinction reserved for respected attorneys who are committed to furthering the organization’s mission of promoting camaraderie among members of the bench and the bar in the Philadelphia area. Mr. Sachs will serve a three year term on the Board of Directors.

Started in 1892, The Lawyers’ Club of Philadelphia is a professional legal organization that has been steadfast in its efforts to create good fellowship between lawyers and members of the legal profession in the Philadelphia region and Judges throughout Philadelphia and the state of Pennsylvania, including Judges in the Supreme, Federal, Superior, Commonwealth, and Appeals Courts.

Our team of Philadelphia medical malpractice lawyers at Shrager, Spivey & Sachs is pleased to announce that our firm has received the 2017 Best Law Firm Award from Best Lawyers®. Because this award is only presented to a small number of firms every year, such an achievement displays a firm’s ability to handle complicated cases and provide excellent, top-tier representation on behalf of clients.

Our team is pleased to announce that Attorney Robert Sachs will be a faculty speaker at the Association for Justice’s Nursing Home Litigation Fundamentals Seminar, which will take place on October 28 and 29 at the Santa Fe Community Convention Center & Hilton Santa Fe Historic Plaza in Santa Fe, New Mexico. This will be the second presentation of the seminar that took place in Philadelphia last spring.

The event is designed for both experienced and new nursing home lawyers and will cover a wide range of issues related to nursing home litigation, including the process from a case evaluation to resolution. Speakers for the event will include former chairs of AAJ’s Nursing Home Litigation Group. While presenters will undoubtedly share information regarding new tactics that can be used during litigation, the presentation will focus on the fundamentals which remain crucial in these types of cases.

Speaking about the upcoming event, Sachs states, “I am pleased to be on the faculty along with some of the top nursing home lawyers in the country. I have been asked to address medication errors.” He adds, “Sadly, I have handled too many cases like this. These cases run the gamut and include everything from criminal actions, to ‘mercy’ killings, to dosage calculation errors, to chemical restraint cases. This is a very active area for nursing home litigation.