Accela Rehab Springfield: Food Temperature Failures - PA

Inspectors visited Accela Rehab and Care Center at Springfield on August 14, 2025, following a complaint. What they found was straightforward and, for the residents eating there every day, hard to dismiss.

A test tray conducted at 12:28 p.m. that day, with Food Service Director Employee E3 present, told the story in numbers. Milk registered at 59.9 degrees Fahrenheit. Apple juice came in at 58.6 degrees. Tangerines measured 70.8 degrees. The facility's own written food temperature policy requires cold foods to be kept at or below 41 degrees Fahrenheit. The milk and juice were nearly 20 degrees above that threshold. The tangerines were nearly 30 degrees above it.

Five minutes after the tray was tested, at 12:33 p.m., the Food Service Director confirmed that the items were too warm to be palatable.

That confirmation mattered, because residents had been raising the issue themselves. One resident, identified in the inspection report as Resident R4, told inspectors during an interview at 11:00 a.m. that food temperatures are often cold. Another resident, Resident R2, was more direct: the food, they said, is simply not good.

The gap between what residents described and what the test tray revealed is worth noting. Residents said the food came cold. The test tray showed the cold items arriving warm. Both complaints point to the same failure: food is not reaching residents at the temperatures it should.

Cold foods served above 41 degrees Fahrenheit fall outside safe food handling standards for a reason. Milk at 59.9 degrees has been sitting in a temperature range that allows bacterial growth. Apple juice at 58.6 degrees has been out of the cold zone long enough to register nearly 18 degrees above the required maximum. Whether the problem originates in how food is stored, how it is transported to the units, or how long it sits before distribution, the test tray result on August 14 captured the end product: food that was not safe, not appetizing, and not what residents were supposed to receive.

The facility's food temperature policy, though undated, is explicit. Foods sent to units for distribution will be transported and delivered to maintain temperatures at or below 41 degrees for cold items and at or above 135 degrees for hot items. The inspection found that standard was not being met for cold foods. The Food Service Director did not dispute it.

Accela Rehab and Care Center at Springfield is located at 850 Papermill Road in Glenside. The inspection was classified as a complaint survey, meaning someone raised a concern that prompted the visit. Inspectors rated the level of harm as minimal harm or potential for actual harm, and noted that some residents were affected.

The residents who spoke to inspectors that morning had no way of knowing what the thermometer would show a little over an hour later. They knew what they experienced at mealtimes. Resident R4 had noticed it enough to describe it as a pattern. Often cold, they said. Not once, not recently. Often.

For people living in a nursing facility, meals are not a minor detail. They are one of the few daily experiences that residents can anticipate, look forward to, and judge for themselves. When the juice arrives warm and the milk is closer to room temperature than refrigerator temperature, that is not an abstraction. It is lunch.

Full Inspection Report

The details above represent a summary of key findings. View the complete inspection report for Accela Rehab and Care Center At Springfield from 2025-08-14 including all violations, facility responses, and corrective action plans.

Additional Resources

• View all inspection reports for Accela Rehab and Care Center At Springfield
• Browse all PA nursing home inspections