The first hospital in Waukegan opened more than a century ago. Since then, the city’s last standing hospital has been sliding toward extinction.
Those who operate Vista Health System appear to be ignoring a key element of the healer’s oath: First, do no harm.
Vista Medical Center East has either been in the midst of a terrible streak of bad luck, or it’s about to sink under the weight of its location in an underserved and under-insured community. “Beleaguered” is a term that resonates with the current situation at Vista, which dates to the Roaring Twenties.
It must be difficult for the hospital’s local managers to follow directions from corporate masters headquartered on the West Coast in Glendale, California. American Healthcare Systems is known for purchasing distressed hospitals — of which Vista East surely is after two years of the company’s ownership — across the U.S., hoping to return them to increased profit.
The 228-bed hospital’s most recent shock to potential patients and the Lake County medical community was the announcement earlier this month that the hospital will suspend its obstetrical and neonatal services late next month.
Dropping a maternity ward seems to be a step backward in the company’s revenue stream, although hospital officials say Vista East incurs annual losses of more than $4.2 million from obstetric services. They also point to the decreasing birth rate in the county, noting an obstetrics department needs 100 births a month to cover costs and retain medical maternity care.
The decision follows other bad news that has emanated from the medical center at Sheridan Road and Glen Flora Avenue. Dozens of employees were laid off after Vista East had its trauma center designation temporarily revoked in February 2024, meaning triage cases were sent to other county hospitals. The designation was restored the following month.
Other services have been cut back, doctors have complained of not being paid and there was the case of the Waukegan woman who wandered out of her hospital room and was found hours later on the building’s rooftop frozen to death.
The Illinois Hospital Report Card says only 38% of patients would definitely recommend Vista Medical Center East. That figure is 32% lower than the state average.
Vista East is also delinquent in paying more than $1 million in 2023 property taxes. A tax lien has been placed on the property, while ComEd sued the hospital earlier this year for more than $800,000 in unpaid electric bills. The hospital also owed Waukegan nearly $200,000 in water bill charges.
This situation is far different than when Scottish immigrant Jane Strang McAlister, who with her husband raised sheep and lived in Millburn, eventually settled into a home on Clayton Street in Waukegan. She donated $21,000 — close to $1 million in today’s dollars — for the construction of a hospital building, according to an account by the Millburn Historical Society.
Until then, a six-bed hospital, founded by the fledgling Lake County Hospital Association, was set up in Waukegan at 720 N. Ave., which was rented to the group beginning in 1891. The county’s doctors donated time to the hospital for free.
McAlister’s money went toward eventually erecting the 34-bed hospital building at the southwest corner of North Avenue and Franklin Street, where beginning in 1896, a home was used for the city’s next small hospital. Now an apartment building, it previously was a dorm for students at private Shimer College, which called the city home from 1978 to 2006.
The four-story Jane McAlister Hospital, forerunner to Victory Memorial Hospital, had its first patient on Sept. 24, 1904, and included a school of nursing. The first operation was performed three days later. Jane McAlister, who became a leading county philanthropist of her day, died of bronchial pneumonia on Oct. 29, 1903, at age 86.
The McAlister hospital closed in 1923 after Victory Memorial Hospital — named as a tribute to Lake County troops and sailors who fought for the Allied victory over Germany in World War I — opened. Victory dedicated a $3.5 million addition to its west wing in 1969.
Saint Therese Hospital, established by the Missionary Sisters, Servants of the Holy Spirit, opened its doors at Washington Street and McAree Road in Waukegan in 1929. Thus, Waukegan had two hospitals.
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St. Therese, which eventually became St. Therese Medical Center, was designated the county’s first trauma center in 1973 and had a satellite in Lake Villa. The St. Therese building and adjacent parking garage were eventually razed.
Both hospitals had a number of firsts and at the time provided innovative medical care for patients in eastern Lake County. Many perhaps remember the annual “Taste of Victory” fundraisers held at various area locales which benefited Victory’s chemical-dependency program, and the holiday-themed “Festival of Trees” where employees at county companies decorated Christmas trees which later were auctioned off for charity.
Over the decades, the city’s hospitals once provided a high degree of care for residents. Like vital signs for patients, it is vital that Vista East remain operational, either in its current for-profit status, or in some other safety-net status which will require financial input from various private/public partnerships.
Charles Selle is a former News-Sun reporter, political editor and editor.
X: @sellenews