Elroy Health Services: Dining Room Hit 56 Degrees - WI
Federal inspectors measured the temperature during a March 2025 survey and found that the heating problem had been raised at resident council as far back as January. By mid-February, nothing had been fixed. The blinds that staff said they close to hold in heat were up throughout the survey period, inspectors noted, on a day when the room measured 64.4 degrees at its warmest.
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See the Derila PillowThe facility's maintenance worker, identified in the report as Maintenance G, told inspectors he did not monitor the ambient temperature in the dining room. When asked directly whether 56.8 degrees was an acceptable temperature for the space, he said no, it was not.
The administrator, identified as NHA A, took a different view of the situation.
He told the surveyor that the facility only takes additional measures when the temperature outside drops below zero, at which point staff close the blinds and can provide blankets and sweaters to residents who ask for them. He said the facility had shut the dining room in January during the coldest weather, but added that the facility likes to respect residents' choice to eat there.
When the surveyor asked whether he would consider 56.8 degrees to be a homelike environment, the administrator said he believes the facility does everything it can to maintain a homelike environment, but that they respect resident choice above all else.
The facility does need two new boilers, the administrator acknowledged. He said they were waiting for warmer weather to install them. A contractor had been scheduled to repack the ceiling with insulation on February 14th. That appointment was canceled. It was rescheduled for February 21st.
The inspection was completed March 3rd. The report does not indicate whether the insulation work was ever done.
What the report captures is a gap between what management said and what the building actually provided. The administrator described a facility attentive to resident comfort and choice. The thermometer said something else. The maintenance worker, asked a straightforward question, agreed with the thermometer.
The framing of "resident choice" is worth pausing on. Residents were not choosing between a warm dining room and a cold one. They were choosing between a room that had fallen below 57 degrees and eating somewhere else. The administrator's position was that offering a sweater, if asked, satisfies the facility's obligation to the people living there.
Inspectors classified the violation as causing minimal harm or potential for actual harm, affecting some residents. That classification sits at the lower end of the federal harm scale, but it reflects a finding that the conditions were real and that residents were exposed to them over a period of weeks, not a single day.
The resident council had flagged the cold dining room in January. A month passed. The scheduled repair was canceled. Inspectors arrived in late February and found blinds open and temperatures still outside the acceptable range.
The administrator's comment that the facility "does everything they can" to maintain a homelike environment was made to a surveyor who had just pointed out that the dining room was sitting at 56.8 degrees. The surveyor asked the question. The administrator answered it the way he answered it.
Residents at Elroy Health Services were eating their meals in a room that the facility's own maintenance worker said was unacceptably cold. They could ask for a blanket.
Full Inspection Report
The details above represent a summary of key findings. View the complete inspection report for Elroy Health Services from 2025-03-03 including all violations, facility responses, and corrective action plans.
Additional Resources
Data source: This article is based on inspection data downloaded directly from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) via Medicare.gov. CMS releases inspection reports in bulk; we publish the findings as documented by state surveyors in the official Form CMS-2567 Statement of Deficiencies.
Plan of correction: The CMS report we receive does not include the facility's plan of correction. Facilities submit plans of correction separately to state survey agencies and those responses may not be reflected in CMS data at the time of publication. The absence of a plan of correction in our data does not mean one was not filed. Readers who want information about corrective steps taken are encouraged to contact the facility directly or their state survey agency.
Corrections may have occurred: Inspection reports reflect conditions observed on the date of the survey. Facilities may have implemented corrections, staffing changes, additional training, or other remediation since the report was issued. We report what CMS provides and encourage readers to seek current information from the facility.
Editorial process: Inspection findings are extracted from CMS source documents and synthesized using AI, reviewed for factual accuracy against the original report by our editorial team.
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Last verified: November 14, 2026 · Our methodology
ELROY HEALTH SERVICES in ELROY, WI was cited for violations during a health inspection on March 3, 2025.
By mid-February, nothing had been fixed.
Health inspections identify deficiencies that facilities must correct. Violations range from minor documentation issues to serious safety concerns. Review the full report below for specific details and facility response.