With confirmation that the Illinois Department of Public Health sent staff last week to monitor cooling issues at West Suburban Medical Center comes this question: Did West Sub completely replace its HVAC system on its Oak Park campus in 2024 as it has claimed?
Responding to emailed questions from Growing Community Media two weeks ago about West Sub admitting 22 patients transferred from Weiss Memorial Hospital, its sister facility, after a complete failure of its HVAC system, the hospital’s contracted communications person said West Sub’s entire HVAC system had been replaced last year. Asked the cost of that repair, the spokesman said the price was not publicly available.
However, the next day, when the Sun-Times and Block Club Chicago reported on patient and family complaints of overheated rooms at West Sub, Dr. Manoj Prasad, CEO of Resilience Healthcare, parent of West Sub and Weiss, was asked at a press conference about conditions at the Oak Park hospital. He told reporters that West Sub had spent more than $1 million to replace West Sub’s HVAC in 2024.
The dissonance between having a new HVAC system in 2024 and major parts of the hospital experiencing room temperatures well into the 80s led Wednesday Journal and the Austin Weekly News to file a Freedom of Information request with the village of Oak Park, asking for any and all public records of West Sub or its parent pulling permits to replace its HVAC in 2024. The newsroom also asked for any record of village staff inspecting work done on a new HVAC system last year.
The reply to the FOIA was that the village government had not found any records that were “responsive” to GCM’s request.
GCM sent an email to the West Sub communications person asking for an interview with Prasad and for any documents detailing the major HVAC project. The communications person replied that his firm no longer worked for Resilience as of last week.
Two emails then sent directly to Prasad from GCM have gone unanswered.
An initial response from the Illinois Department of Public Health on July 7 confirmed that the agency had sent staff to assess cooling conditions at West Sub in response to complaints.
Oak Park’s public health department did not participate in the inspection by the Illinois Department of Public Health, according to Dan Yopchick, village spokesperson. But the village did advise callers concerned about overheated conditions at West Sub to call the state’s Office of Health Care Regulation Complaint Hotline.
