Trotwood Health & Rehab: Dish Sanitation Failures - OH
On August 18, a federal inspector watched as the dietary worker, identified in inspection records only as Employee 220, set up the three-compartment sink used to clean dishes for residents. With the kitchen's hot water heater broken, the dishwasher was useless. Staff had been hand-washing dishes for roughly a month. To get water hot enough for the first sink, someone had boiled water on the stove in a 33-gallon pan and poured it in.
Employee 220 added detergent directly from a one-gallon jug, pouring without measuring. The second sink held plain hot water for rinsing. Then he turned to the third sink, the sanitizing basin, and poured in just under half a gallon of sanitizer.
When he tested the water with a strip, it turned dark blue. The reading was 400 parts per million.
Employee 220 knew immediately it was wrong. He told the inspector the strip should turn green, not dark blue, and that 400 parts per million was too much. He also said he had no measuring devices. There was nothing in that kitchen to tell him how much chemical to use.
The Dietary Manager, identified as DM 944, confirmed all of it in an interview four days later. The hot water had gone out approximately one month before the inspection. The measuring device for the chemical solutions had been broken for what she described as "a long time." Staff had no way to measure cleaning or sanitation solutions to ensure safe and effective cleaning of the dishes. Because the dishwasher required hot water to operate, dietary staff had been using the three-compartment sink as the only option.
The administrator verified the water temperature findings when inspectors raised them.
The violation was cited under F0812, food and nutrition services, with a harm level of minimal harm or potential for actual harm, affecting many residents.
What the inspection record doesn't answer is how long the sanitizer had been running at the wrong concentration before anyone tested it in front of an inspector. Employee 220 said he had no measuring devices. The dietary manager said the measuring device had been broken for a long time. The hot water had been out for a month. At some point before August 18, someone was washing dishes in that sink without knowing whether the sanitizer was too strong, too weak, or anywhere close to effective.
Dishes sanitized in solution that is too concentrated can leave chemical residue. Dishes sanitized in solution that is too weak can leave pathogens. Either way, the food and utensils reaching residents' trays were coming out of a sink that nobody could verify was clean.
The facility is a nursing home. Its residents are not healthy adults with robust immune systems who can absorb a round of foodborne illness and recover in a day. They are elderly, many with compromised health, and an outbreak of gastrointestinal illness in a long-term care setting can move fast and land hard.
Nobody in the kitchen had a measuring cup. The hot water heater had been broken for a month. The measuring device for chemicals had been broken for longer than that. And the dietary staff kept washing dishes anyway, pouring from jugs, guessing at amounts, running test strips that told them the water was wrong and then, presumably, washing dishes in it regardless, because there was no other option and no one had fixed the equipment.
The inspection was conducted as part of a complaint investigation, logged under Master Complaint Number 2589044.
Full Inspection Report
The details above represent a summary of key findings. View the complete inspection report for Trotwood Health & Rehab LLC from 2025-08-22 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.
Professional review: All content reviewed by Christopher F. Nesbitt, Sr., NH EMT & BU-trained Paralegal.
Last verified: October 7, 2026 · Our methodology
Trotwood Health & Rehab LLC in DAYTON, OH was cited for violations during a health inspection on August 22, 2025.
With the kitchen's hot water heater broken, the dishwasher was useless.
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.