Illinois Nursing Home Guide Blog

Symphony nursing home

Symphony nursing home chain has 5 homes in Chicago among state’s 25 hardest hit by COVID

The Lincolnwood-based company has had 147 coronavirus deaths and 1,016 coronavirus cases involving residents and workers, Illinois Department of Public Health data show.

By Frank Main and Caroline Hurley Nov 20, 2020, 4:30pm CST

Symphony Care Network | Post-Acute Care and Senior Assisted LivingFive Chicago nursing homes run by Symphony Care Network are among the top 25 in Illinois for coronavirus cases and deaths, according to a Chicago Sun-Times analysis of state data.

The Lincolnwood-based chain — which operates 29 nursing homes in Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin and Michigan — has had 147 coronavirus deaths and 1,016 coronavirus cases involving residents and workers, according to data from the Illinois Department of Public Health.

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South Beloit nursing home fined for violations

SOUTH BELOIT, Ill. (WIFR) – A South Beloit care facility is fined $25,000 after the Illinois Department of Public Health says it failed to ensure a patient’s safety to prevent a death at Fair Oaks Rehab back in August.

According to the department’s report, Fair Oaks faces a number of other violations including failure to evaluate residents to make sure they received enough supervision and assistance and making sure all treatments and procedures were administered to patients as ordered by a doctor.

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Illinois has plenty of other dysfunctional nursing homes Governor Rauner should visit

By Ryan Smith

I took notice of your week-long stay at the Illinois Veterans Home in Quincy. You could’ve just done the easy thing and popped by for a quick photo op while promising to fix the nursing home facility where bacteria-contaminated water caused three outbreaks of Legionnaires’ disease over as many years—killing 13 and leaving dozens of elderly veterans critically ill. Instead you showered, slept, and ate there (how was the meatloaf?). You pledged to replace the pipes and do other upgrades to the nursing home’s infrastructure.

That’s great, Bruce. Is it OK if I call you Bruce?

Some of your political opponents have called your unusual decision to lodge in Quincy “a cynical and transparent publicity stunt.” They note the conspicuous timing, following a WBEZ report about the crisis. Plus, you’re deep in campaign mode—locked in a billionaire-versus-billionaire battle against J.B. Pritzker. But I refuse to believe that you camped out at the vet facility just because of the potential political fallout. Sure, you didn’t want to be the next Rick Snyder, the Michigan governor haunted by the drinking water crisis in Flint (where deadly outbreaks of Legionnaires’ disease have also killed at least a dozen over the last few years). But you were genuinely concerned with some ailing vets, I bet.

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Illinois nursing homes sue state over low Medicaid rates

Tracy Rucinski

CHICAGO (Reuters) – A handful of Illinois-based nursing homes sued the state’s Department of Healthcare and Family Services on Friday, saying low Medicaid rates are jeopardizing their ability to provide adequate quality of care.

In a lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, five groups that jointly operate more than 100 skilled nursing facilities across the state said Illinois’ reimbursement rates and methodologies violated certain requirements under the Medicaid Act.

The Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services and the governor’s office did not immediately return requests for comment.

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Family sues nursing home over death

champaign county nursing home

Posted: Jan 03, 2018 8:49 PM CST Updated: Jan 04, 2018 8:56 AM CST

URBANA, Ill. (WAND) – A family is suing a nursing home after a woman’s summer death.

Workers at the Champaign County Nursing Home discovered 78-year-old Sonya Kington’s body on June 6, 2017 in an outdoor courtyard. Video surveillance at the facility showed Kington entering the courtyard area before 2 p.m., when the temperature stood at 87 degrees.

Investigators with the Illinois Department of Public Health say workers didn’t find Kington until after 5 p.m., when she had already died. Kington’s skin was hot and vomit showed on the side of her mouth. Champaign County Coroner Duane Northrup found hyperthermia caused her death and ruled it accidental.

In response, the nursing home fired two of its workers.

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When nursing homes push out poor and disabled patients

 

By: Jocelyn Wiener – @inquirerdotnet California Healthline / INQUIRER.net US Bureau / 02:35 AM December 27, 2017
Anita Willis says the social worker offered her a painful choice: She could either leave the San Jose, California, nursing home where she’d spent a month recovering from a stroke — or come up with $336 a day to stay on.

She had until midnight to decide.

Willis’ Medicaid managed-care plan had told the home that it was cutting off payment because she no longer qualified for such a high level of care. If Willis, 58, stayed and paid the daily rate, her Social Security disability money would run out in three days. But if she left, she had nowhere to go. She’d recently become homeless after a breakup and said she couldn’t even afford a room-and-board setting.

In tears, she said, she agreed to leave. Thus began a months-long odyssey from budget motels to acquaintances’ couches to hospital ERs — at least five emergency visits in all, she said. Sometimes, her 25-year-old daughter drove down from Sacramento, and Willis slept in her daughter’s car.

Read more: https://usa.inquirer.net/9024/nursing-homes-push-poor-disabled-patients

Ex-administrators fault management in nursing home closure fallout

By Dean Olsen Staff Writer

More than three months after a Springfield nursing home closed with little warning, many families and former patients of Oak Terrace Healthcare Center are waiting for refunds and wondering why they were put through such stress.

Oak Terrace’s two most recent administrators blame Home Life Companies, the Delaware, Ohio-based business whose top officials made all the key decisions involving Oak Terrace, for what they say was the company’s greed, ignorance and lack of vision.

“The residents — they didn’t have any interest in them except as a source of revenue,” former Oak Terrace administrator Tom Mullins told The State Journal-Register.′

Mullins, 71, an Oreana resident and longtime Illinois nursing home administrator, said Oak Terrace never paid him the $6,559 he was owed for his 17 days of work in August and September.

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Nursing homes pushing out more poor and disabled patients

Anita Willis says the social worker offered her a painful choice: She could either leave the San Jose, Calif., nursing home where she’d spent a month recovering from a stroke — or come up with $336 a day to stay on.

She had until midnight to decide.

Willis’ Medicaid managed-care plan had told the home that it was cutting off payment because she no longer qualified for such a high level of care. If Willis, 58, stayed and paid the daily rate, her Social Security disability money would run out in three days. But if she left, she had nowhere to go. She’d recently become homeless after a breakup and said she couldn’t even afford a room-and-board setting.

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Illinois Jury Awards $5M to Nurse Fired After Reporting Alleged Abuse

A central Illinois jury has awarded $5.2 million to a nurse who claims she was fired from a nursing home after reporting alleged abuse.

The (Bloomington) Pantagraph reports Katrina Wesemann worked as a licensed practical nurse at a Dwight facility in 2012 when she was fired. She alleges she was let go because she wouldn’t follow a director’s orders to increase dosages of anti-anxiety medication to agitated residents and refused to change or omit records of suspicious injuries.

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Former Woodstock nursing home employee says workers violated Illinois Whistleblower Act

Lawsuit: Former Hearthstone Communities worker says she was fired after reporting abuse

WOODSTOCK – A lawsuit filed by a former Woodstock senior living center worker accuses the business of firing her for trying to report abuse disclosed by a patient.

Juana Walsh is suing Christian Living Communities and Hearthstone Communities for more than $75,000 in money damages and the reinstatement of her job.

The lawsuit, filed Nov. 30 in McHenry County court, comes exactly one year after Walsh was fired from her job at Hearthstone Communities, 920 N. Seminary Ave., Woodstock.

The suit names two employees – facility Administrator Joni K. Fisher and Director of Nursing Patricia A. Birks – who Walsh believes violated the Illinois Whistleblower and Nursing Home Care acts after firing her for reporting the abuse.

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