DeKalb County

Sandwich Living & Rehab Center

Medicare rating
1 out of 5
4
findings of immediate jeopardy, the most serious kind
40%
less nursing care than its residents are expected to need, against a research benchmark
$302,370
in federal fines recorded since 2023

Medicare’s overall rating for this home. The inspection part of it is graded on a curve against other Illinois homes, so a star here does not mean what it means in another state.

902 East Arnold Street, Sandwich, IL 60548 · (815) 786-8409
63 beds · about 31 residents on a typical day · for-profit partnership

Staffing

All nursing staff, per resident, per day
3 hours 20 minutes

Residents here are expected to need about 5 hours 34 minutes, given how sick they are. This home reports 40% less. The average Illinois home reports 3 hours 27 minutes.

Registered nurses only
42 minutes

Registered nurses have the most training of the nursing staff on a shift. Residents here are expected to need about 1 hour 28 minutes of their time. This home reports 52% less.

Nursing staff who left in the past year
56%

About half of the nursing staff left within a year. High turnover means the people caring for your family member keep changing. The average Illinois home reports 44%.

Where the benchmark comes from

Staffing is the measure most closely linked to how residents do, and the one families almost never see. How much nursing care a resident needs depends on how sick they are, so we compare this home against the level its own residents are expected to need. The marker on the first two bars shows that level. It is a research benchmark, not a legal limit. The hours shown are the hours the home filed with Medicare, before any adjustment for how sick its residents are.

What inspectors found

Inspectors visit every nursing home and write up what they find. This home has 57 findings on record going back to 2023, 35 of them after someone filed a complaint.

The 13 serious findings here

Immediate jeopardy February 5, 2026

Accidents and supervision

The home did not keep the building free of hazards, or did not supervise a resident closely enough to prevent an accident.

The home fixed this on February 6, 2026.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F689Ensure that a nursing home area is free from accident hazards and provides adequate supervision to prevent accidents.

Actual harm December 5, 2024

Nutrition

A resident did not get enough food or fluids to stay healthy.

The home fixed this on January 31, 2025.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F692Provide enough food/fluids to maintain a resident's health.

Actual harm December 5, 2024

Bedsores

The home did not prevent or properly treat pressure sores.

The home fixed this on December 27, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F686Provide appropriate pressure ulcer care and prevent new ulcers from developing.

Actual harm September 24, 2024 From a complaint

Resident not protected from abuse or neglect

The home did not protect a resident from abuse or neglect by anyone.

The home fixed this on October 10, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F600Protect each resident from all types of abuse such as physical, mental, sexual abuse, physical punishment, and neglect by anybody.

Immediate jeopardy July 3, 2024 From a complaint

Food not chopped or softened

The home did not serve food chopped, ground, or softened for residents who needed it that way.

The home fixed this on July 23, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F805Ensure each resident receives and the facility provides food prepared in a form designed to meet individual needs.

Actual harm January 25, 2024

Nutrition

A resident did not get enough food or fluids to stay healthy.

The home fixed this on February 16, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F692Provide enough food/fluids to maintain a resident's health.

Actual harm January 19, 2024 From a complaint

Bedsores

The home did not prevent or properly treat pressure sores.

The home fixed this on February 13, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F686Provide appropriate pressure ulcer care and prevent new ulcers from developing.

Actual harm January 19, 2024 From a complaint

Bladder and bowel care

A resident did not get proper help with continence care.

The home fixed this on February 13, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F690Provide appropriate care for residents who are continent or incontinent of bowel/bladder, appropriate catheter care, and appropriate care to prevent urinary tract infections.

Actual harm December 8, 2023 From a complaint

Poorly run

The home was not managed in a way that let it provide proper care.

The home fixed this on January 3, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F835Administer the facility in a manner that enables it to use its resources effectively and efficiently.

Immediate jeopardy December 8, 2023 From a complaint

Accidents and supervision

The home did not keep the building free of hazards, or did not supervise a resident closely enough to prevent an accident.

The home fixed this on January 3, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F689Ensure that a nursing home area is free from accident hazards and provides adequate supervision to prevent accidents.

Immediate jeopardy December 8, 2023 From a complaint

Resident not protected from abuse or neglect

The home did not protect a resident from abuse or neglect by anyone.

The home fixed this on January 3, 2024.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F600Protect each resident from all types of abuse such as physical, mental, sexual abuse, physical punishment, and neglect by anybody.

Actual harm October 6, 2023 From a complaint

Poor quality of life

The home did not provide the care and services residents needed to live as well as they could.

The home fixed this on October 10, 2023.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F675Honor each resident's preferences, choices, values and beliefs.

Actual harm October 6, 2023 From a complaint

No counseling or practical help

The home did not provide the counseling or practical help a resident needed, such as arranging services from outside.

The home fixed this on October 10, 2023.

Medicare’s wording

Federal tag F745Provide medically-related social services to help each resident achieve the highest possible quality of life.

Everything on record

Immediate jeopardy 4 Has caused, or was likely to cause, serious injury, harm, impairment or death
Actual harm 9 A resident was hurt
Potential for harm 44 Could have caused harm. No one was hurt. The most common kind.

627 of the 666 nursing homes in Illinois have fewer findings of harm or immediate jeopardy on record than this one.

Medicare has blocked payment for new admissions at this home 4 times, for 188 days in total. The most recent block lasted 14 days and started February 28, 2026.

What these levels mean

Immediate jeopardy The most serious finding there is. Medicare’s words: noncompliance that has caused, or is likely to cause, serious injury, harm, impairment, or death. About 2 in every 100 findings nationally.

Actual harm A resident was really hurt, not just put at risk. About 3 in every 100 findings.

The letter is Medicare’s own code for how many residents were involved. Immediate jeopardy covers J, K and L. Actual harm covers G, H and I. The later the letter, the more residents were affected.

The plain-English line under each finding describes the rule the inspector cited. It is not an account of what happened. Medicare’s own wording of the rule is printed with it, and the full inspection report is the record of the incident.

This home has 4 findings under three federal tags that are counted together, and they do not all mean abuse: F600 is abuse or neglect, F602 is the wrongful use of a resident’s belongings or money, and F603 is involuntary seclusion. Medicare also publishes a separate abuse warning icon, which is narrower and time-limited, and this home does not currently carry it.

What you can do

Numbers only go so far. These are two things most families do not know they can do.

Ask for today’s staffing sheet

Every nursing home must post how many nurses are working each shift, keep 18 months of it, and show it to you on request. Ask for today’s, then last Saturday’s. Weekends are when staffing thins out.

Call the ombudsman before you decide

Every state has a free, confidential long-term care ombudsman. You can ask how many complaints a specific home has had and what they were about. You can find your state’s office through its department of aging.

Where this comes from

Inspection findings, staffing hours, fines and star ratings on this page are published by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, a federal agency, and are current as of August 1, 2026. We reload after each monthly release, and the footer of every page shows both the release date and the date we loaded it. The federal ID for this home is 146133.

What these numbers do not say

Fines can be appealed and reduced. The amount shown is what CMS had recorded as of this release. Medicare’s penalties file covers a rolling window of the last few years rather than a home’s whole history, so this is what Medicare publishes today and not everything this home has ever been fined. The year beside the figure above is the earliest fine Medicare still lists for it.

The level of care residents here are expected to need, and the gap, are not Medicare figures. We work them out from this home’s own Medicare case-mix score using the published CASE formula (Harrington and others, Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, 2025). It is a research benchmark, not a legal limit.

Inspection findings are recorded by state inspectors on behalf of Medicare. Staffing hours come from payroll records the home files with Medicare, and Medicare audits a sample of them. Star ratings partly reflect quality measures the home reports about itself, which is why we show inspections and staffing separately rather than only the star.