2 Investigators: City, State Assumed The Other Was Inspecting Hospital Kitchens
(CBS) -- If you have to go to the hospital, you most likely trust the doctors and staff to make you feel better.
But as CBS 2's Pam Zekman reports, food served at some hospital cafeterias could be making you sick.
After looking through inspection reports for 12 Chicago hospitals, the 2 Investigators found critical food violations. Even worse, they uncovered a bureaucratic problem that left some hospital kitchens with no oversight at all.
The city thought state government was inspecting the kitchens, while the state thought the city was conducting the inspections.
In 2014, the kitchen at John H. Stroger Jr. Hospital had a critical violation for a broken dishwasher that was not sanitizing dishes and another violation for chicken stored at dangerous temperatures.
"You would think they would be more interested in the well-being of the patients," said Anthony Teague, a former patient at Stroger Hospital.
In 2014, Resurrection Hospital also had multiple critical food-temperature violations. This forced the hospital to throw out multiple food items, including lettuce, eggs, cheese sauce, Italian sausages and burgers.
"Food that is not stored at the proper temperature is likely to grow bacteria, which could make people sick," says Gerrin Cheek Butler, director of food protection for the Chicago Health Department.
Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center and Mount Sinai Hospital both failed inspections in 2014. At Northwestern Memorial Hospital, the visitor cafeteria failed two inspections in 2014 for the presence of fruit flies and for food-temperature issues. That cafeteria is now closed for remodeling.
"It is a critical violation for any pest to be in a food establishment because pests carry diseases," Butler says.
These are just the violations the 2 Investigators uncovered by analyzing public inspection records. There could be many more hospitals with problems because some hospital kitchens that prepare food for patients only have not been inspected for years.
The 2 Investigators were told by state officials that the Chicago Health Department was inspecting those kitchens. But the Chicago Health Department was under the impression that the Illinois Department of Health was doing the inspections.
"There was a miscommunication," Butler says.
Back at Northwestern, the patient-only kitchen hasn't been inspected since 2013, and at Rush Medical Center, the patient kitchen was last checked in 2012 by a not-for-profit accrediting agency. Both hospitals refused to release the results of those inspections.
After the CBS 2 inquiries, the Illinois Department of Public Health sent out a memo instructing local health officials to inspect both public and patient kitchens from now on.
It's unclear just how many hospital kitchens serving patients exclusively fell through this health inspection crack.
Butler says she's unaware of who was responsible for this oversight failure.
The inspections of all 38 of Chicago's hospital kitchens -- both patient and public -- should soon be completed. All the hospitals referenced in this report say that food safety is a critical concern and that any problems were fixed after the failed inspections.
Below are the complete statements from some of the hospitals referenced in this report.
Sinai Heath Systems
"Sinai Health System contracts with major national food service specialists to manage and operate the patient and public food services at its hospitals … the Chicago Department of Public Health conducts yearly inspections of our Sodexo and Aramark food service operations, and any issues that are raised are quickly corrected. At no time has any inspection of the kitchen or servicing facilities at any of our hospitals risen to a level that resulted in suspending food service, nor has the health or safety of any patient, staff member, or the public been at risk."
Stroger Hospital
"CCHHS cooks as well as managers at Stroger are ServSafe certified and have their City of Chicago certification. At Stroger we follow the HACCP procedures and Sodexo food safety procedures on a daily basis, ensuring our food is kept safe.
"Additionally, Stroger's food service is inspected by the Cook County Department of Public Health several times a year to confirm that we are meeting all health and safety requirements."
RUSH
"We have reviewed the Joint Commission's report from the commission's most recent survey of Rush, and there is no information in it that is relevant to your story."
Mt. Sinai
"Sinai Health System contracts with major national food service specialists to manage and operate the patient and public food services at its hospitals -- Sodexo at Mount Sinai Hospital and Schwab Rehabilitation Hospital, and Aramark at Holy Cross Hospital. The Chicago Department of Public Health conducts yearly inspections of our Sodexo and Aramark food service operations and any issues that are raised are quickly corrected. At no time has any inspection of the kitchen or serving facilities at any of our hospitals risen to a level that resulted in suspending food service, nor has the health or safety of any patient, staff member or the public been at risk at any time."
Resurrection
"After the Chicago Department of Public Health issued two food storage violations to the retail section of the Presence Resurrection Medical Center kitchen last July, the problems were immediately corrected."
Northwestern – no statement provided