SPRINGFIELD, Ill. – The Illinois Department of Public Health has disciplined two central Illinois long-term care facilities: Asta Care Center of Bloomington, a 117-bed skilled care facility in McLean County; and Champaign County Nursing Home, a 243-bed skilled, intermediate and sheltered care facility in Champaign.

Asta Care Center was fined $10,000 for failing to thoroughly investigate allegations of inappropriate sexual behavior by a resident toward other residents, to implement interventions to prevent such behavior, and to notify the department and the abused residents’ physicians.

In one incident, an employee found the resident in bed with another resident. The facility, however, did not notify the woman’s physician and downplayed the incident to police and a hospital physician.

There were at least four additional allegations regarding the resident’s behavior toward other residents. The administrator told staff not to document the resident’s behaviors and she did not conduct thorough investigations or report the incidents to the department.

Staff said for several months they had recommended that the resident be moved to a different facility.

Champaign County Nursing Home was fined $10,000 for failing to immediately intervene on behalf of a resident presumed to have been sexually abused by an employee.

A nurse’s aide walked into a resident’s room and noticed an employee’s shoes and pants on the floor behind a drawn curtain. The resident was lying partially clothed in bed with the side rail down, something the resident could not do herself. The aide took the resident’s roommate to the bathroom and the alleged perpetrator was left alone with the resident.

The aide reported the incident and the night nursing supervisor was informed, but she waited 28 hours before reporting it to the nursing director.

Because immediate steps were not taken, the alleged perpetrator continued to have access to the resident as well as other residents at the facility. In addition, the failure to follow notification procedures delayed the start of a criminal investigation and an examination by a physician of the resident who may have been assaulted.

The alleged perpetrator and the nursing supervisor were both terminated.

Both facilities have requested hearings on the department’s actions. No hearing dates have been set.

Source: Illinois Department of Public Health