Elmhurst Memorial Healthcare

According to Elmhurst Hospital, not all mothers are created equal. My wife and I had the unfortunate experience recently of having out 1 month hospitalized at Elmhurst due to a fever. Upon admission we were told that my wife would get meals while staying with my son. This was a lie.
When my wife called to order food she was asked if she breastfeeding. My wife has struggled with breastfeeding for our children and has been unable to do so. A situation which has been emotionally difficult for her. When she stated that she was not breastfeeding, she was advised that hospital policy is to only feed breastfeeding mothers for free and that she would have to pay for meals.
What kind of policy is this? My wife just watched her month old son get stuck with an iv, have vials of blood drawn from him and listened to him scream while they tried to draw spinal fluid from him. Sat with him, awake all night while his fever spiked. After all of this, they have the nerve to attempt to enforce a policy which makes one clear statement — unless you breastfeed, you are not a mother deserving of all the care we can offer.
This world needs to wake up. Just because you breastfeed you child, does not make you a good mother. Just because you give your child formula, whether by choice or necessity, does not mean you are an inferior mother. This arbitrary sentiment needs to stop being a gauge on quality of motherhood — what truly matters is doing everything you can to care for you child. My wife goes above and beyond in that regard.
A hospital policy which brings a loving, caring wonderful mother to tears is malpractice.

Do not go here. The doctors are good, but the followup service, billing and administration is so abhorrent you will lose days fixing their problems.
Elmhurst Sleep Center is not a full sleep center, they just run the diagnostics, despite what their website says. Misrepresentation to say the least.

This is the worst energency department I’ve been to. The first time I was seen there the world series was on so no one did any work and when i requested to have the empty IV taken out so I can get discharged it took 3 separate attempts to get someone in the room. On top of that when someone did come in the room he said «An empty IV bag won’t kill you.» Really? How much more rude can you get? When they did take the IV out of my arm she ripped it out from a foot away-​nice nursing skills! NOT. However, that was about 3 years ago. When I went there the second time, last month, I waited 2 hours to be seen. When I was seen the staff was much better this time. But now i’m getting calls from a place that files legal claims and they are saying that my visit is a legal claim after I told them numerous times my own dog bit my own face. How is this a legal claim? No one will answer my questions, but have asked me 3 times for my insurance information that I have supplied 3 times. My insurance already has a claim that they have paid. Something is very fishy about that, and no one will listen to me when I say that it was my dog who bit my face! what, are you going to sue my dog? I hate this place and I refuse to go back. If I’m ever hurt again I would rather die trying to get to another place than go to this place ever again. I don’t recommend it at all, they double bill you, make you wait, and now are trying to do this to me!

Just received a bill from May 2014 from when I saw Dr. Boyd for a routine physical. She looked at me for maybe 5 minutes basically said I did not need another physical for 10 years and then had me do «routine» blood work that she insisted would be covered by my insurance. (she claimed most her patience have the same insurance and it is «always covered») I called in a month later once I received at $ 220 bill, and she was nice enough to call me back and let me know she would handle this for me. She said it must have been an issue with coding system. I called a few months later again when I still saw the balance with my insurance and the billing department at the hospital said that Dr. Boyd had taken care of everything and that I did not owe anything. Almost a year and a half later when I no longer even carry that insurance anymore I am now stuck paying the $ 220. Clearly this place is extremely disorganized if I am just receiving a bill for this after so much time.

Absolute WORST place to have a baby. Beautiful, yes … but the doctors are very rude and will subject you to tests that you do not consent to. How is it my sister is in her 6^th month of pregnancy and has been sick for the past month with the flu because it’s her first pregnancy and she refuses to take anything at all — and the doctor tells her to see her primary care doctor, doesn’t check her at all BUT instead gives her a DRUG TEST for Cocaine and etc. Yes, I would understand it if there were a history of Drug Use or if she were on Public Aid… but it’s quite the opposite. To top it off, when the bill was received and she called to see what it was for and disputed it — the Doctor’s response was «we can drug test whenever we want and if you don’t like it you can find somewhere else to go.» IN WRITING! COMPLETELY RUDE and Uncalled for! I had both of my children at Gottlieb Memorial, and despite it being a Hospital that is not in the least bit fancy — the Doctors there are GREAT. If you are worried about having your baby in a beautiful hospital, by all means go here — but beware of getting unnecessary tests, rude doctors, and condescending attitudes that will blatantly tell you that their job is to nod and smile and tell you it will be ok while you tell them you are not feeling well. WHO SAYS THAT TO A FIRST TIME MOTHER?

My daughter went to the ER because a wooden soccer platform fell on her head. I went back and forth with their billing department about insurances. I called my insurance and they said they would cover the costs 100%. I get 2 bills in September saying that I owe. I called their billing, and they said that the insurance was being processed to disregard it. The next bill will be what I owe. A month later, I received no bill. I figured it was all paid. I am now getting calls from their credit collection agency saying that we need to talk about my account! I have not received any bills in a month on what my new bill is! Do not go here unless you want to be hassled by creditors saying you owe, when you do not.
Edit: I have called my insurance company. They are still waiting for a response from the hospital. I emailed and called the hospital, they are still waiting for a response from the insurance company. The hospital swears they are not going to put it into collections. That it is not my fault but the insurance company. Now, I got a letter saying it went into collections and that they are using a collection agency they told me they do not use. This is the most confusing hospital billing department!

Do not come to this Hospital. The primary care Dr. Assigned to my wife from Dupage Medical Group discharged my wife after 4 days of declining physical status and no ride home. The doctor had the nurse unplug her iv which was the only thing sustaining her life and told her to go home. Not to mention my wife has been on morphine for four days for an obstructed small intestine and cannot take even water by mouth without vomiting. I am filing a formal complaint with the medical board against the Dr. And the hospital. If you are considering a hospital for treatment please do yourself a favor and look elsewhere. A cook county hospital is a safer bet than Elmhurst Memorial Hospital. Do not come here if you value your health.

The place looks nice and is clean. That’s about all I can say. I’m visiting a family member here and am a nurse as well so I’m shocked at the lack of independence the nurses have here. If you want things done, you constantly have to be on their back about it (can you check the blood pressure? It’s been about 8 hours since it was last done; can you check her blood sugar?) It’s now been over 40 minutes since I’ve asked for a medication and no ones showed up. Being an RN myself I know sometimes these money hungry hospitals make nurses take on more patients than they should and staffing sucks, but when my family is in the hospital, I really don’t give a crap!

HORRIBLE!!! Rude staff, no sympathy, nobody seems to know what’s going on with their patients, don’t keep up on the cleanliness of rooms, shady doctors that give you false information before they have their facts straight (for example) telling me my mother in law had cancer and 2 months to live and then changing that information into a bad case of pneumonia and then changing that into tuberculosis (thank god it wasn’t!)and then back to cancer again?! And still no answers! This place is just ridiculous and a joke! Beautiful building, but such a waste! So unprofessional, I wouldn’t be surprised if they got shut down! Made me sad watching how cold they were towards my helpless mother in law during her unfortunate stay here!

Sadly I’m a regular at this place but I’m grateful to have this great hospital. It’s a fairly new Hospital and everything is up to date and state of the art. The staff has always been very sensitive and caring which is what you need when you feel like crap.
They have a great lineup of well-​trained staff. Downside it can be a pain to get an appointment.

This review is for billing practices only. I have two insurance companies — primary and secondary. Which ever one pays the least, that is what Elmhurst memorial says I owe. They end up getting more money than if I had one insurance company in many cases. I have friends who are in private practice who say «they can’t do that!» Well, they do and I cannot find any agency that prevents this. My insurance companies have called them but it does not do any good. Also, I paid one bill twice. They never contacted me and when I tried to apply that to another bill they sent me to a collection agency.

This hospital is plain ridiculous

Rating is not for quality of care with doctors or nurses; no beef with them. Strictly for billing practices and complete lack of informed consent for patients when it comes to unexpectedly high costs of a simple blood test.
I feel completely duped and extorted by this hospital. My son went in for a singular blood test to help determine what was causing his eczema. ONE BLOOD DRAW. How much do you think a simple blood test should cost? I was thinking that I’d pay, oh maybe a couple hundred bucks at most. You know what they actually charged for that one blood test without telling me in advance or warning me that this isn’t a normal standard blood test? $ 3400, of which I was responsible for $ 1250 (my insurance company paid the rest). I called them multiple times to dispute and explain the charge; no one called me back. I had a HealthAdvocate call on my behalf and they gave her the runaround, too. All they said is that the claim is valid. I also got threatening letters from their collection four months after the blood test, even though they were on notice I was disputing the amount.
PARENTS, if a physician tells you that their hospital can do a simple blood test to help determine what is causing your son’s skin’s rash, it is NOT simple and it is going to cost you BIG TIME. Please insist the hospital/​doctor tell you upfront how much that is going to cost and DO NOT GO FORWARD until they give you the price in writing. Do not assume simple blood tests are nominal in costs. They tried to downplay my son’s blood test as a «simple routine test» without every disclosing or warning me that it costs several thousands dollars!!! And you’d think the hospital would call ahead of time to also doublecheck that you could actually afford the test. NOPE. After the blood test results are in, you get this invoice for a massive amount, and then the hospital ignores your request to substantiate the cost. They give you the runaround when you try to question why a simple blood test should cost that much money. Both my husband and I have each had surgery in the past few months, and our respective surgeries did not cost as much as this ONE BLOOD TEST. And then they start the fun with the threats to sue and ruin your credit score.
It’d be one thing if the hospital were upfront with us to explain the unexpectedly high cost, but NOPE. Really, is it that hard? You don’t think a regular consumer would be caught off guard when you charge then $ 1250 for one simple blood test? Nice. Oh, and I especially loved when they sicced their collection agency on me only after a couple of months and sent me threatening notes about filing lawsuits and ruining my credit score.
Thanks for the love, EMHC. No really, THANKS.

This hospital makes me want to get sick because it is that amazing. If you think it was Danica Patrick in the commercials that brought me here, you might be right; however, in all honesty, it was a neurologist that I found fantastic transferring to Elmhurst.
My first experience at the hospital was when my Primary Care Physician sent me to the ER after 12 days of migraine. Since my prescriptions weren’t helping, he wanted to make sure I was not at risk for an aneurysm or stroke. We walked into the ER, I checked in and was whisked away to triage. They brought me back to a room where they finished checking me in and even made copies of my insurance card and took payment from the bedside. The service was absolutely phenomenal. I understood that it was the ER’s job to find an emergent situation, which they did not. We were there for testing and the entire amount of time it took to pump a bag of fluids in my body complete with drugs to try and break the migraine. There was not excessive amounts of wait time and each room had its own private 32″ tv.
I returned a week later for an MRI as an outpatient. I was still suffering through the aforementioned migraine and when I was halfway through the test and told the tech I could not complete it, I was treated with respect and dignity. This goes a long way in my book.
I returned, yet again, for outpatient lab work. The ease with which the staff went from getting me checked in to getting my blood drawn was seamless. Every staff member I encountered throughout the facility was helpful.
TIP: When coming for a blood draw, it is at the Center for Health. Listen to the appointment reminders for the color parking lot where to park. It is incredibly helpful!

AVOID THE CHEAP HEART SCAN IF YOU DO NOT HAVE ANY SYMPTOMS!!!
I made a big mistake this weekend, I listened to the Marketers at Elmhurst Memorial Healthcare and went in for their $ 75 Heart Scan special.
What they didn’t tell me before the scan:
1) its a CT Scan — this means you will get a dose of radiation equivalent to 280 x-​rays… They don’t even mention that its a CT scan on the website, one of the staffers said they generally do not tell folks
2) I shouldn’t have this scan if I have had other CT scans recently (I had two others in the past year including abdominal with contrast) and if I don’t have any symptoms (I dont, but I do have risk factors which they don’t even talk to you about until AFTER the scan (and they dont ask you your history either, just take your money)
I learned all of this stuff after the fact when I started to research radiation levels.
Now I have to deal with the fact that I have way more exposure than I should have and an elevated cancer risk that is still not fully understood.
Shame on you Elmhurst Memorial Healthcare. We are consumers not health professionals, you are supposed to be the professionals and in the business of helping people, not hurting them.

The reason for the 2 stars is completely billing related. I was there one time for an ultrasound, the place was nice, staff was pretty friendly. Not my best experience but not bad.
I checked my insurance before calling the hospital and they were in network. I called to make the appointment and they told me they were in network also. The ultrasound was done, never met the radiologist, was told they’d look at it later and send the report to my doctor.
The next month I got a rather large bill from the hospital and paid it. I maxed my out of pocket for the year and should have no further medical bills. A month later I get a bill from Elmhurst Radiologists for another $ 164. I called and told them I shouldn’t owe anything. Turns out the radiologist who reviewed my ultrasound was not in network. I would have never agreed to have an out of network radiologist review it and charge me another $ 164. They refused to work with me and said I have to take it up with Elmhurst Hospital. Elmhurst Hospital directed me to their billing who said there’s nothing they can do. They actually said I should have the name of the person I spoke to when I made the appointment. I’m just really disappointed no one would take responsibility for this.

I hope to never, ever return to this hospital after my mother spent weeks here as an inpatient over the summer. However, the staff on whole was very, very friendly. The care she got was amazing. The doctors we encountered (her AMAZING vascular surgeon, ER doc, cardiologist, etc) were top of the line and very good.
Large cafeteria. Starbucks. Lovely grounds, visiting areas, chapel, and waiting areas. Beautiful.
Hope to never step foot in here again but it is a great hospital!!!

I don’t even know where to begin. I am just fed up with this hospital after coming from Loyola which I should have never left in the first place. All this hospital does is waste my time and more importantly my money.
My first bad experience was two years ago with the ER: I was really sick for over a month (I thought I had whooping cough). I couldn’t sleep for weeks. No Doctor could see me right away so finally couldn’t take in anymore I went to the ER (one week before Christmas) at 2am in the morning. I have to admit it was a smooth process, almost no one was there, they took my in right away. So, they put me in a gown, did a bunch on unnecessary tests and the Doctor came up with a general cold. I asked him for medicine so I could at least sleep at night. He sent me home with nothing but a $ 200 bill. Sooooo, one week later — I’m still not better. It’s CHRISTMAS EVE — I just want to be better so I can sleep and have a nice Christmas. Luckily, I was able to see a Doctor who gave me medicine. I was LITERALLY better the next day!!! I could sleep and my cough went away!!! I was so pissed. I wasted my time by going to the ER and having to go back a second time that could have been prevented if the ER Doctor would have given me medicine and I wasted my money by paying a hefty ER bill (even with insurance) and another Co-​pay that could have been avoided.
My second bad experience was about a month ago with Internal Medicine and the Phone Systems. Same concept of wasting my time and money, but different department. I had symptoms of Strep Throat so I tried calling to set up an appointment — never happened. I would call first thing in the morning, during my lunch at work and forget about after 5pm. Sooo, I decided to take off work and go in to the hospital to see someone (be it a Nurse or Doctor). The Receptionist in Internal Medicine denied me at first, but after getting upset enough and explaining the phone systems suck — she had me see a Doctor. I waited about an hour. The Doctor did a strep test which came back negative. He said it’s probably a viral infection and would go away on it’s own. He said if it doesn’t get better in a couple of days to come back. Well, I had set up an appointment with my Primary Doctor for that following Saturday for something else anyways. My symptoms did not get better. They got much worse. My primary Doctor said it could be viral, but will give me Penicillin/​Amoxcillan anyways to kill any bacteria just in case. The only thing that went away was my sore throat, but my tonsils were still swollen and white stuff all over. After I was done taking the Penicillin for the 10 days, all other symptoms were still there. The sore throat soon came back the day after taking the medicine. I was the same for about a week. Then, I started to have a pressure above my stomach, felt light-​headed, had a low fever, and broke out into hives all on my arms and legs. I was about fed up with this as this was over a month now and I still didn’t know what I had. I called my Doctor to ask him what is going on. The first time I called, the phone operator said she would have a Nurse call me back (no one called me for 4 days). I finally called on Saturday to file a complaint. Only then, did they have a Nurse speak to me but she only said the Doctor would need to see me AGAIN and would fit me in that day. This would be my THIRD time seeing a Doctor in a month for the same problem! My primary Doctor came to the conclusion that I’m allergic to Penicillin which I had to disagree. I’ve never had a bad reaction to Penicillin in my life. I asked him what I had then, he still had no answers and flip flopped and said it was bacterial when the last time he told me it was viral. He said the penicillin made me better which it clearly did not and I still had symptoms. I know I am not allergic because I had spoken with a family friend who is a Pediatrician and he gathered that I could have Mono. All the symptoms he listed were what I had. Literally, every single symptom. He said the Penicillin made it worse since I had a virus (not a bacterial infection) and that’s why I had a rash and fever. I told my Doctor this and I’m guessing the Doctor felt embarrassed and denied this when I told him. Now, he put on my chart that I’m allergic to any type of Penicillin when I’m not. Own up to your mistakes and don’t make a patient suffer because of it. What if I need Penicillin now and I’m denied it because it’s Doctor ordered on the chart.
Overall, this hospital is all show and no substance. The Doctors waste your time and money. Instead of treating the problem the first time; they waste your time by making you come back when they could have treated it the first time. In the end, they get more money for making us come back. Bunch of crooks. This happened with 3 Doctors which is enough. Not to mention time wasted on the phones trying to cancel or make an appt. I am glad to say I will no longer be with this hospital.

Nice clean hospital, no issues there. I just feel that most of the staff here genuinely don’t care about the patient. I say this because I haven’t met anyone at this hospital that has spoken to me or my wife with any sense of care. They seem kind of cold here. That’s the world today I guess, sad to see that.

I love this hospital. Over the past 2 years my husband, son and I have been treated in the ER and also as in patient. I have been satisfied with all aspects of the care that we received.
We were seen quickly in the ER and our problems were attended to promptly.
If you need to be admitted, the hospital has all private rooms. Very nicely decorated and very quiet. Since my son was admitted late at night, I stayed overnight and slept on the pull out sleeper couch. They had the sleeper couch all made up for me by the time we arrived in his room. Nice touch.
The nurses and patient techs were great.
The cafeteria food is very good.