April hearing set to decide on $50,000 fine for Belleville nursing home
An administrative law judge has scheduled another hearing into whether a Belleville nursing home should pay a $50,000 fine after a woman was found dead strapped to a wheelchair at the bottom of a flight of stairs last year.
The hearing is scheduled for April 27 at 9 a.m. in Springfield, according to Illinois Department of Public Health spokeswoman Melaney Arnold. The agency held a preliminary hearing for the case on Thursday.
IDPH cited Midwest Rehabilitation and Respiratory after Juanita Simmons, 85, died on March 12, 2015. Nursing home staff found Simmons at the bottom of a flight of stairs.
Video surveillance showed Simmons sitting alone in the hallway, staring at a soda machine just minutes before her body was found in the nearby stairwell. Nursing staff called 911, but did not tell the police dispatcher about the death and asked that an ambulance be sent to the home.
After emergency medical technicians confirmed Simmons was dead, nursing home personnel allowed the family to have Simmons’ body transferred to a Montgomery County funeral home. Under Illinois law, the coroner’s office must be notified of an accidental death at a nursing facility so they can conduct an investigation into the cause and manner of death.
Steve Blisko, who is the principal investor in Senior Healthcare Management, could not immediately be reached for comment on Friday. Senior Healthcare Management, based in Skokie near Chicago, operates Midwest Rehabilitation and Respiratory, which was formerly known as Calvin Johnson Nursing Home. The company also operates 10 other nursing homes in the Southern Illinois area. They all have the lowest rating given by Medicare, a one-star rating.
In 2012, another Midwest patient died after wandering away from the facility. Aubrey Giles walked away from the nursing home and was found frozen to death in a creek. A lawsuit filed against Midwest by Giles’ estate alleged the nursing home did not promptly notify police when staff noticed Giles had left.
The home has had five wrongful-death lawsuits filed against it in the last four years, including one filed by the family of Simmons.
This story was originally published March 25, 2016 at 11:44 AM with the headline "April hearing set to decide on $50,000 fine for Belleville nursing home."