WARREN, Ohio — Once again, the fate of the Trumbull Regional Medical Center and Hillside Rehabilitation Hospital is in limbo.
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The permanent closure of both facilities was slated to lay off nearly 1,000 workers due to Steward Healthcare, the now former owner of Trumbull and Hillside, filing for bankruptcy in May 2024.
However, Insight Health System took over as the interim non-owner operator of both Trumbull and Hillside, effective Sept. 11.
Employees thought they were safe from layoffs and could finally take a breather.
RELATED: Threat of Trumbull Regional Medical Center shutting down fades
But in yet another turn of events, Insight Health Center has posted to their website, "Due to additional abrupt developments in Steward Health Care's bankruptcy proceedings and the mounting lack of transferred dollars owed for healthcare services delivered to patients at Trumbull and Hillside hospitals, all inpatient, outpatient, and ER services are on diversion as of 3:00 p.m. March 27th, 2025."
Future appointments were canceled in the "interest of patient safety."
Also posted to the front door of Hillside is a notice of closure.
"We're just trying to stay positive and hopefully going to get back to work," Tom Connelly told me on Thursday.
Connelly is a registered nurse as well as the union president for Trumbull Memorial Hospital.
He estimated that 700 to 800 Trumbull Regional Medical Center employees were laid off in March.
"That includes some people that are not bargaining unit members. There's quite a few people that work there," Connelly added.
Connelly shared that hospital employees did receive their last two weeks of pay, but are not receiving pay during this period of unknown.
"We have not received our vacation time. That was supposed to come tomorrow (Friday), and I don't believe it is. I don't know exactly why. I'm sure my members will wonder about it," Connelly stated. "We still have several weeks of vacation time that we're supposed to get, and I think they're having some trouble computing it and getting it all ready, plus I'm not sure I know what their finances are. I don't know what their capabilities are right now."
While Connelly wants the hospital to reopen to secure job stability, he said he just wants to get back to serving the residents of Warren.
"If you go to [Mercy Health St. Joseph Hospital] right now, it is a mess. There are more and more and more patients clogging their emergency room, clogging their surgery schedule. They don't have enough nurses. They don't have enough. We want to get ourselves back to running," Connelly said. "The performance of the nurses and other personnel at Saint Joe's is nothing short of miraculous."
With Trumbull and Hillside out of commission for the time being, it leaves the City of Warren without a hospital.
Connelly said he met with Insight Health System on Thursday, which gave him hope. He said it sounds like the ER portion of Trumbull Regional may open up in the next month.
In the meantime, three Ohio Congressmen sent a letter this week to the U.S. Attorney General's Office requesting an investigation into the legality and transparency of Steward Healthcare System LLC's operations of Trumbull and Hillside.
The lawmakers raised serious concerns about the potential misuse of public funds and lack of clear, accurate communications to local officials and hospital staff.
“Given your experience and ongoing advocacy for public accountability, we respectfully ask that your office or an appropriate investigative body consider evaluating the legality of the events that led to the subsequent closures. If fraud or abuse played any part in this outcome, it is essential that those responsible be held accountable. The citizens of Mahoning Valley deserve answers, and we must work collectively to ensure that such closures are not allowed to proceed without rigorous scrutiny,” said the letter.
I talked with one of the Congressmen who signed off on the letter: Rep. Dave Joyce (OH-14).
"Steward group had picked up and left these people unemployed and left the people of the valley without services, and as we're fighting hard right now to make sure we keep rural hospitals open," Joyce told me on Wednesday. "The bankruptcy court was allowing Steward to continue to maintain the records for billing and has the licensing in which they could get paid by the different state services or private insurers. All this money was out of pocket for Insight while they're delivering services. Steward was billing but not paying Insight. Unfortunately, there didn't seem to be any recourse for them."
Joyce said he understands why Insight had to temporarily close the two facilities as it became fiscally irresponsible to continue.
"To me, as a former prosecutor for many years, this is either fraud or theft," Joyce stated. "I know Attorney General Bondi's got a lot on her plate, but this is something that's very important to our constituents and for us. We want to make sure that somebody looks at this and tells us whether or not fraud or theft exists."
Joyce said Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost was sent a similar letter, but there was seemingly no action taken.
"I'm not sure what happened. It's probably a jurisdiction issue," Joyce said.
I asked Joyce why the decision to ask for a federal investigation is happening now and not when the temporary closure was announced in March.
"We just couldn't seem to get any reaction from folks," he responded. "We want to try to force the issue so they can get them back and running the facilities, so they don't lose the work staff that's valuable."
While Connelly welcomes an investigation, he's not sure how it'll help employees and patients right now.
"I don't want them to lose sight of the fact that we are struggling here and that investigation is not gonna help us... from struggling," said Connelly. "It's fine that they're looking into what's been done to us, but that's not really gonna help us take care of people. We need to get back to work. We need to have nurses and doctors taking care of patients right now. I'm hoping that they look at the big picture."
