Stone Cottage Care Center: Accident Hazard Violations - IA
The citation, issued September 4, falls under a category federal regulators call Quality of Life and Care Deficiencies. It is among the most common types of nursing home violations in the country, and among the most consequential. Residents of long-term care facilities are, by definition, people who need help managing risks that most adults handle on their own. When a facility fails to control the physical environment around them, the people least able to protect themselves are the ones left exposed.
Inspectors classified the violation as scope and severity level D, meaning it was isolated in nature and did not produce documented actual harm. That last part matters less than it might sound. A level D finding still means inspectors concluded there was potential for more than minimal harm. The threshold is not whether someone was hurt. It is whether someone could have been.
Stone Cottage Care Center is a nursing home in Sigourney, a small city in Keokuk County in southeastern Iowa. The complaint inspection that produced this citation was not a routine scheduled visit. It was triggered by a complaint, meaning someone, a resident, a family member, a staff member, or another party, reported a concern serious enough to send inspectors to the door.
The inspection report does not specify what the accident hazard was, what supervision gap existed, or which residents were affected. What it records is that inspectors found the deficiency, that it was real enough to cite, and that the facility was given until September 26 to correct it. The facility reported that correction was made by that date.
Eleven deficiencies in a single inspection is a number worth sitting with. One citation can reflect a bad day or an isolated lapse. Eleven citations suggest something more systemic, a building where multiple standards of care were not being met at the same time, across enough areas that federal inspectors documented them separately. The inspection report reviewed here covers only the accident hazard finding in detail, but the existence of ten additional deficiencies alongside it is part of the public record of this facility's performance.
For families considering Stone Cottage Care Center, or for those who already have a loved one there, the September inspection adds to a picture they are entitled to see in full. Nursing homes in Iowa, as elsewhere, are required to post inspection results and make them available to residents and families. The complete report from this inspection, covering all 11 deficiencies, is publicly available through the federal Care Compare database.
The facility's response, correcting the cited deficiency within three weeks of the inspection, is the expected procedural outcome. Correction plans are required. Follow-up inspections determine whether the corrections held. What the record cannot capture is what the hazard looked like in the days or weeks before inspectors arrived, how long it had existed, and how many residents moved through that space before anyone with authority to document it did.
Keokuk County has a population of roughly 10,000 people. Sigourney is its county seat. For many families in the area, Stone Cottage Care Center is not one option among many. It may be the closest facility, the most affordable, or the one where a spouse or parent has lived for years. That context does not excuse a citation for preventable accident hazards. It makes the expectation of basic safety more urgent, not less.
The September 4 inspection is now part of this facility's permanent federal record.
Full Inspection Report
The details above represent a summary of key findings. View the complete inspection report for Stone Cottage Care Center from 2025-09-04 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: September 25, 2026 · Our methodology
Stone Cottage Care Center in Sigourney, IA was cited for violations during a health inspection on September 4, 2025.
The citation, issued September 4, falls under a category federal regulators call Quality of Life and Care Deficiencies.
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.