The suits in the mergers and acquisitions department at American Healthcare Systems must not be too excited with their purchase of Vista Medical Center East in Waukegan considering the bad news continuing to emerge from the city’s lone hospital.
The one-time Victory Memorial Hospital has become a public relations nightmare with a litany of unhealthy dealings since Glendale, California-based American Healthcare bought it in July 2023. The purchase, including assets and about $15 million in debt, was the third ownership change in just over five years.
With the buyout, corporation officials say they have invested more than $15 million in new state-of-the-art medical equipment. Yet, from recent events, money doesn’t seem to be helping the perception patients in Waukegan, North Chicago, Beach Park and Zion have toward the privately owned hospital.
Since the sale, state regulators revoked Vista’s Level II Trauma Center status last February, which caused Lake County officials to question American Health’s financial and community commitment. Illinois Department of Public Health officials said the hospital lacked essential medical services to be a Level II trauma facility, as well as a blood bank and a full-time trauma coordinator.
The change meant ambulances could no longer transport patients needing immediate emergency care to Vista and was directed to transport them to other hospitals, such as Northwestern-Lake Forest Hospital or Advocate Condell Medical Center in Libertyville, Lake County’s main trauma center. The designation was reinstated about a month later.
For a while, several OB-GYN physicians jumped to other county hospitals to deliver their patients’ babies, although the doctors seem to have returned to Vista to continue the procedures. Lake County Coroner Jennifer Banek — a certified registered nurse anesthetist who has practiced at the hospital — has also raised previous concerns after she said medical professionals were leaving Vista because they had not been paid.
Then, earlier this month hospital officials announced they were furloughing nearly 70 non-medical personnel, nearly 9% of the hospital’s workforce. Officials said the action was a cost-cutting move, noting the hospital’s patient base is heavily uninsured or underinsured.
Now there is the latest incident at Vista, located at Sheridan Road and Glen Flora Avenue on the city’s Near North Side: The death of a Waukegan woman who was found last week on a roof of the hospital in below-freezing temperatures.
The circumstances surrounding the death preliminarily attributed to hypothermia of Chelsea Adolphus, 28, — who died about two days after checking herself into the hospital — remain hazy: Like how she got on the rooftop from her fifth-floor hospital room. Why did staff on her floor fail to determine she was missing for about seven hours until she was discovered on the roof in her medical gown? Why weren’t doors armed with alarms?
The family of Adolphus has demanded answers to some of those questions and more. They deserve them, as the community does, and those who may find themselves future patients at the hospital.
Coroner Banek said this week her office was notified by hospital staff of the death in the emergency room as doctors and nurses worked more than 10 hours to raise Adolphus’ temperature from 50 degrees. Banek has requested the Illinois Department of Public Health probe the cruel death, also asking that all evidence associated with the case be preserved. Toxicology reports are pending.
And there are discrepancies in what happened. According to Clifford Ward’s News-Sun story earlier this week Vista President Kevin Speigel, who has expressed remorse over the death, said the hospital contacted Waukegan police to report the incident.
Banek, who in the past has been critical of the hospital and its mission, said her office informed the police. Family members of Adolphus say Vista medical staff gave them three conflicting stories about how and where her body was found.
Once upon a time, Waukegan had two hospitals, both highly regarded. But time has taken its toll on both of them.
Victory, which was renamed Vista, opened in 1923 with a mission to, “provide value-based healthcare services” for the community. It had Lake County’s first blood bank.
Saint Therese Hospital, established by the Sisters of the Holy Spirit, opened its doors in Waukegan in 1929. It introduced a number of firsts in Lake County, including an intensive care unit, inpatient psychiatric care and rehabilitation units, along with a department of social work. In 1973, Saint Therese was designated Lake County’s first official trauma center, staffed with physicians and nurses specially trained in triage and trauma care.
History has not been kind to both medical centers. Saint Therese was closed years ago and its site, which included a heliport, at Washington Street and Keller Avenue, is being razed.
City, county and state officials are watching the healthcare quality being performed at Vista. The death of Chelsea Adolphus and any investigation into her death, should add impetus to making sure patients have nothing less than top-notch medical treatment when they check in.
Charles Selle is a former News-Sun reporter, political editor and editor.
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