{"id":353957,"date":"2025-12-17T11:22:33","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T11:22:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/353957\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T11:22:33","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T11:22:33","slug":"public-health-agency-cites-patient-care-concern-at-ct-hospital","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/353957\/","title":{"rendered":"Public health agency cites patient care concern at CT hospital"},"content":{"rendered":"

The state Department of Public Health<\/a> continues to cite issues concerning patient care at Saint Francis Hospital,<\/a> with the latest inspection report<\/a> finding the hospital allegedly failed to implement \u201ctransmission-based precautions when patients were suspected of having a contagious illness putting other patients and staff at risk\u201d and also failed to respond to a patient\u2019s asystole, \u201cthe complete absence of electrical activity in the heart.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a result, the hospital was again identified for immediate jeopardy on Oct. 3, which \u201crepresents a situation in which noncompliance by providers, suppliers or laboratories has placed the health and safety of recipients in its care at risk for serious injury, serious harm, serious impairment or death,\u201d according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On June 3, the hospital also had received an immediate jeopardy designation when the \u201chospital failed to ensure staff followed the standard practice for medication administration,\u201d with a patient receiving \u201c2500 micrograms of Fentanyl over a 15-minute time period in error\u201d resulting in the patient going into cardiac arrest, according to an earlier inspection report from DPH.<\/p>\n

In both cases, the immediate jeopardy designation<\/a> was lifted after the state agency verified that the hospital implemented immediate corrections, according to the inspection reports. This follows more than a dozen reports from an independent monitor overseeing Saint Francis Hospital spotlighting two patient deaths related to inadequate staffing at the hospital.<\/p>\n

State Sen. Saud Anwar, co-chair of the Public Health Committee, and several nurses at the hospital said they are concerned about patient safety at Saint Francis, alleging there is inadequate staffing and resources to meet the demand for care.<\/p>\n

Dire need<\/p>\n

Anwar said after speaking to the president of Saint Francis, he remained deeply concerned about the situation at the hospital, reaching out several weeks ago to the CEO of the Trinity Health in Livonia, Michigan, the nonprofit faith based health care system overseeing numerous hospitals across 25 states, including Saint Francis Hospital and Saint Mary\u2019s Hospital, which is overseen by its regional partner Trinity Health Of New England<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel that Trinity Health in Michigan has somewhat abandoned their Connecticut sites at least from their actions,\u201d said Anwar. \u201cI think that they need to invest more resources into this institution and they need to start to listen to the doctors who have been part of the community for a very long time and have been quite concerned about what is going on and also make sure that the leadership should be decentralized, including the financial support that should be there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel that the local team is dependent on the headquarters to give them the resources and support,\u201d the senator said.<\/p>\n

\"OneOne of the walkways at Saint Francis Hospital in Hartford on Friday, Nov. 21, 2025. (Aaron Flaum\/Hartford Courant)<\/p>\n

Anwar noted Connecticut has already faced the actions of Prospect Medical Group, a private equity company in bankruptcy that state and federal officials claimed drained profits at the expense of patient care. The company owned Waterbury Hospital, Manchester Memorial and Rockville General hospitals before selling the properties. Last week, the Connecticut Office of Health Strategy approved Hartford HealthCare\u2019s emergency certificate of need application<\/a> for the transfer of Manchester Memorial Hospital, including the Rockville campus, and other assets. UConn Health has won the bid to acquire Waterbury Hospital for $13 million and is working through the certificate of need process.<\/p>\n

Anwar said he has not heard from the CEO of Trinity Health, Michael Slubowski, in Michigan despite his staff sending messages and emails. Trinity Health in Michigan did not return two emails for comment.<\/p>\n

The senator emphasized that Saint Francis is one of the most underserved in the entire state of Connecticut and that it \u201cneeds to have a viable, strong healthcare system.<\/p>\n

\u201cSaint Francis was one of the top in New England for cardiac care at one point and this institution has systematically been eroded since it became part of Trinity national,\u201d he said, referring to the hospital being overseen by Trinity Health of Michigan.<\/p>\n

Saint Francis Hospital said in a statement to the Courant that \u201cin a sign of our continued progress toward full compliance with regulatory requirements, Saint Francis Hospital is not designated as being in immediate jeopardy by DPH following the department\u2019s review and approval of our corrective action plan in October.\u201d<\/p>\n

In response to questions regarding concerns about inadequate staffing at the hospital, Saint Francis said \u201cwhile staffing challenges remain for many hospitals in this area and around the country, including Saint Francis, we are prioritizing how to strengthen our workforce while delivering quality care to patients.\u201d<\/p>\n

The hospital has struggled over the last year. More than 100 pages of inspections from DPH over the last year that were reviewed by The Hartford Courant highlighted violations of health regulations including failing to follow physician orders that directed continuous monitoring of patients\u2019 cardiac rhythm; nursing staff administering oxygen without a physician; incidents of patients not receiving medications as directed by a doctor; failing to ensure isolation precautions with patients with illnesses that required such protocols; among others.<\/p>\n

DPH continued oversight of Saint Francis Hospital in August for another six months after inspections uncovered \u201cserious violations of patient safety regulations and protocols at the hospital,\u201d this past summer.<\/p>\n

DPH did not respond to questions from the Courant about staffing levels and patient care at the hospital in time for this article.<\/p>\n

Several nurses who spoke on condition of anonymity have contacted the Courant with concerns about staffing levels and the impact on patient care at Saint Francis. They said numerous nurses have resigned over the last few months, alleging it left the hospital short-staffed and not adhering to the staffing plan.<\/p>\n

One nurse, who spoke on anonymity, said there was a high turnover rate at the hospital and she was concerned about staffing and at times is so inundated that it is hard to meet her own patient\u2019s needs.<\/p>\n

Another nurse speaking on condition of anonymity said the Emergency Department has a \u201cwhole area closed because they don\u2019t have staff.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have nurses doing double or triple work,\u201d the nurse said. \u201cFloors have no staff and are being filled by travelers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Inspection reports highlight patient care concerns<\/p>\n

The latest DPH inspection report highlights that a patient arrived at the ER on Sept. 21 with chief complaints of a \u201crapid heart rate, shortness of breath and chest pain,\u201d according to the report.<\/p>\n

The patient was then placed on cardiac monitoring, according to the inspection report.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe medical record failed to identify Patient #170\u2019s cardiac rhythm when s\/he was placed on the cardiac monitor,\u201d the inspection report said. \u201cReview of the cardiac monitoring electrocardiogram (EKG, a diagnostic tool that records electrical activity of the heart) strips dated 9\/22\/25 identified that Patient #170 experienced asystole (the complete absence of electrical activity in the heart) from 8:02:40 to 8:02:58 (18 seconds = A person will lose consciousness within this period because the blood flow to the brain has stopped.).\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ED Telemetry Communication Log failed to identify documentation of asystole and escalation of Patient #170\u2019s asystole at 8:02:40,\u201d the report stated further.<\/p>\n

The report further stated that the \u201chospital failed to implement timely, necessary transmission-based precautions\u201d pending a concern for meningitis in one patient, and COVID, influenza and Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV) pending for two other patients this past fall.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese lapses in the initiation of precautions placed other patients and staff at risk of infection,\u201d the report stated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The state Department of Public Health continues to cite issues concerning patient care at Saint Francis Hospital, with…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":353958,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[175922,8856,15862,97,252,253,168221,12831,64526,175920,169348,175921,159157],"class_list":["post-353957","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-connecticut-public-health-committee","tag-hartford","tag-hartford-courant","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-max-image-preview","tag-patient-care","tag-public-health-committee","tag-saint-francis-hospital","tag-saud-anwar","tag-state-sen-saud-anwar","tag-trinity-health"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353957","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=353957"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353957\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/353958"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=353957"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=353957"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=353957"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}