Marquardt Village

I live 3,000 miles away and my mother was at Marquardt Village [hereafter Marquardt] located at 1045 Hill St Watertown, WI 53098, for rehab after breaking her left and replacement surgery. Since shes been there it has been IMPOSSIBLE for me to reach her.

I finally was able to reach my mother last night on the phone in her room just before to 11pm.

When she answered the phone she was obviously in distress and painfully explained that she was having sharp pains on the left side of her chest and was having trouble breathing. She also stated that nobody at the facility was taking her seriously nor did they come when she pressed the button for the nurse. I told her I would call her right back that I was going to call the facility and speak to somebody about getting her help. I did exactly that, however I got the third party answering service that answers calls after hours.

I was on hold for nearly ten minutes while the agent attempted to reach somebody at Marquardt. My call got disconnected before the agent came back on the line. She did not call me back even though she asked me for my number. I called my mother back and told her to hold on, that I was having trouble reaching somebody (we have several landlines and two cell phones).

I wanted her on the line as I was concerned about her well-being.

I called Marquardt back and spoke with a different individual. After putting me on hold then returning to the call, she stated that she was unable to reach anybody at the facility and she would take a message for the on call supervisor. While I was waiting for the operator to return to the call, I handed my husband the phone my mother was on while I picked up a third phone and called the Dodge County Sheriff to dispatch the EMS. I did this because mom resides in Dodge County and Marquardt is located in same county.

I explained to the lady at the Sheriffs office my situation and she told me that my mother would be better (and faster) served by calling the Watertown Police since the facility is within the City limits.

Watertown PD dispatched the EMS and mom was transported to the ER. A short time later an employee from Marquardt named Patty called me. She hadnt told me my mother was transported to the ER and I did not know she was at that time. Patty began the call by telling me that she had been in my mothers room ten minutes prior to the EMS arriving and she was sleeping.

She also stated that a short time before that, she had also been in my mothers room and she was fine and never mentioned her chest pains not the fact that she was having trouble breathing. I cannot attest that the later did not occur but I know the part of her story about her being in my mothers room just ten minutes before the arrival of the EMS arrival was untrue. I knew this to be untrue because I had my mother on the phone line with either my husband or myself as I frantically made calls to get her help. I found it strange that she had to explain herself, never mentioning mom had been transported to the ER because at that point I wasnt sure.

Since Patty didnt bring up the outcome of the situation, I asked. It was then she told me that mom was on the way to the ER. One would expect her to start the conversation with this information since it concerned the health of the patient shes been entrusted to care for. Instead she chose to make the conversation all about herself.

Egregious? Absolutely! I was stunned and said you know I was the one that called the EMS. Thats what Ive been told she responded.

The call with Patty lasted 8 minutes and a great amount of time was my explaining how that no matter what time of day or night I call the facility, I am NEVER able to reach a live person.

When Ive been given back numbers to call to reach a live person, all that happens is I get a voicemail. In fact, I had called and left messages on four or five different voicemails the day before (10 December 2019) and of all the messages I left, only one individual called me back but the following day. I asked Patty what number I should call and at first she gave me the number I had called and reached the answering service, 920-261-****. Only after pointing out the obvious did she give me a number to a phone she could be reached at while on her shift that evening.

I never called it because I no longer needed to.

Not to long after speaking with Patty the on call supervisor returned the call I had left with the answering service. When I informed her of the events of the evening, there was a dead silence one could have heard a pin drop. The supervisors name was Ms. Anderson and she was unaware what had just taken place.

I again explained how neither I nor the answering service was able to reach a live person at the facility, how every number I had been given to reach a live person only went to voicemail, how my mother was unreachable practically the entire time shed been there, then I asked her how she would feel if she were in my shoes and questioned why nobody at the facility was reachable and ultimately asked what were they hiding because thats what it looked like.

While speaking with Ms. Anderson, I received a call on a different phone from either the EMS or an individual working in the ER. Ms. Anderson wanted to wait while I took the call and I did not mute the call , I wanted Ms.

Anderson to hear the conversation. The caller told me that my mother was in the midst of an a-fib crisis and they were administering something for said. We discussed moms asthma, enlarged heart, some of the prescribed medications cardia, lasix, Advir etc. She was subsequently moved to ICU where she remains at the time of this writing.

This morning after speaking with my mother I have come to the realization her condition is grave.

I am livid at the actions of the staff at Marquardt and the Company as a whole. I feel patient neglect is a standard rather than an isolated incident. Isolated incidents are the result of a failure or failures in the chain of operations. That is not what happened here.

By the Company making it virtually impossible to reach staff is by design and is an example how they CARE for our ailing loved ones. When an EMERGENCY happens, staff should be available for the patients as well as their family members REGARDLESS of how far away said family member is. The fact that Marquardts own answering service was unable to reach staff during a medical emergency makes me wonder how many times something like this has happened and Marquardt got away with it. One would think there would be safety mechanisms in place so staff can be reached instead of providing the patients family members with useless back numbers and a number that reaches a third party answering service.

What if the time that I spent calling to get her help were critical in her prognosis? I feel my mother is lucky to be alive but maybe the next patient wont be. Marquardt is a toxic environment manifesting a culture of complete disregard for the quality of care, dignity and human life as a whole. What makes this even more egregious than what it already is, they claim to be a Christian organization and I dont drink Kool-Aid, neither should you!

Marquardt should lose its license and taken over by another more qualified organization.

Furthermore, the entity that takes over should be awarded to the interested organization based on the quality of care it provides those it serves and not based on a sealed bid and the almighty dollar. These are peoples lives and the patients in these facilities should stop being seen as comedies and disposable, they are our loved ones and should be treated as if they were their loved one to