The future for two Chicago-area hospitals appears to be in jeopardy, as the owner of Weiss and West Suburban hospitals told reporters that both medical facilities are facing a financial hardship and have an uncertain path forward.
“I think several of you are curious about Weiss, what happened to Weiss, and everybody is afraid that the same can happen here.” Dr. Manoj Prasad said at a news conference Friday.
“The crisis is real…” he said later amid a nearly hour-long question and answer session.
Just hours earlier, Weiss Memorial Hospital closed the doors to its emergency department – one day before the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services was scheduled to withdraw Medicare funding from the hospital after it was found out of compliance with emergency and nursing services.
Prasad said Friday he will likely appeal the CMS decision.
Inspection records, obtained by NBC 5 Investigates, show that CMS made the decision to terminate Medicare funding weeks ago after state health inspectors visited the hospital for a complaint investigation. During that investigation in early July, inspectors with the Illinois Department of Public Health found problems with a makeshift emergency department that had been set up in the wake of air conditioning troubles – which have plagued the hospital all summer.
One medical director told a state health inspector that the emergency department had no tourniquet available to stop the bleeding for a patient who had blown their hand off in a fireworks accident. The medical workers had to make one using an ACE bandage wrap. The patient was eventually transferred.
Another medical director told inspectors the makeshift emergency department was “not safe for patients.” A registered nurse also quit over what she told inspectors were “unsafe conditions.”
“There was nothing that endangered the life or health of anyone,” Prasad said when explaining the troubles at Weiss and the inspections from the state health department that he said – without offering proof – were caused by past employees.
During a lengthy explanation to reporters, Prasad blamed a host of issues for problems at both hospitals, including aging infrastructure and air conditioning chillers that had to be repaired; $81 million in debt from previous hospital owners; aggrieved former employees who made complaints to the state health department; and a changeover in billing software that he says slowed the return of dollars back into the hospitals.
All of it, he said, has left both Weiss and West Suburban hospitals facing uncertain futures.
Both hospitals had issues with either broken or erratic air conditioning over the summer – problems that resulted in patients being transferred.
West Suburban Hospital was also recently cited for a patient restraint violation, IDPH records showed.
But all of the issues, Prasas said, were being addressed through plans of correction.
“There was nothing that endangered the life or health of anyone,” he said.
Prasad also said a recent request for a $10 million loan to the state of Illinois was rejected.
A spokeswoman for the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services sent a statement that did not address NBC 5 Investigates’ questions about when the loan request was made and rejected.
Instead, she stated, in response:
“Any time a hospital closes it represents a significant loss to the community it serves. The Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services (HFS) has provided Weiss with significant financial support and advisement over the years in an effort to support the hospital. Unfortunately, it faced insurmountable challenges that it could not overcome despite state support. Nationwide, the U.S. is seeing hospital closures driven by market forces that are intensified by our nation’s broken health care system, which will only be exacerbated by Trump’s cuts to Medicaid and other lifesaving benefits for the American people.”
When Prasad was asked how long he could continue to operate his hospitals with no financial assistance, he said:
“I’ve been asking myself the same question. I asked that every day and that’s what every day, we look at the budget, look at what we can do and how we can make every dollar stretch,” he stated.
Prasad was also asked what assurances he can make to his employees – will they have a job next month or beyond?
He said he cannot make assurances based on all the unknowns.
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