Owners of St. Louis Nursing Home Fined More Than $55,000
By Jim Nelson | February 29, 2024
ST. LOUIS, MO — As reported by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (subscription required) and The Associated Press, federal regulators have fined St. Louis’ largest nursing home $55,000 after it closed without warning in December. The fine was announced by the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in a letter to the owners of Northview Village.
The skilled-nursing facility was shuddered without warning on December 15, 2023, due to ownership being unable to meet payroll. Between December 15 and 17, when Northview gave up its Medicare and Medicaid contracts, the facility was “in violation” according to recently released documents.
The letter from the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services reportedly says that the $18,770-per-day penalty for those three days will be reduced by 35% if Northview waives its rights to a hearing.
The December 15 closure was chaotic, it has been reported. Many patients were vacated with nothing more than the clothes on their back; some were not able to bring their medical records or even their medication lists; one man, a resident with schizophrenia, wandered off in the confusion and it was more than three weeks before he was found; and, according to advocates for the residents, Northview Village was home to many seniors on Medicaid, including people with mental health and behavioral issues, who were unable to get into other long-term care facilities.
U.S. Representative Cori Bush, who’s from St. Louis, has called for a federal investigation of the owners and of Missouri’s system of overseeing nursing homes.
According to Congresswoman Bush’s January 8, 2024, letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, the “current owner of Northview Village is Healthcare Accounting Services, a company with several out-of-state owners that manage multiple long-term care facilities in the St. Louis metropolitan area.” Congresswoman Bush went on to say in her letter that “since HAS owns several facilities still in operation, there is significant concern that the crisis created by the sudden closure at Northview Village could happen again at its remaining facilities.”
