Auburn Village: Family Not Told of Death for 2 Days - IN
The man, identified in inspection records only as Resident C, had been admitted to Auburn Village with hospice services. He had cancer and diseased arteries. He was not expected to recover. His record included a do-not-resuscitate order and two emergency contacts: a Power of Attorney listed as the first person to call, and a family member listed second.
At 3:40 in the morning on the day he died, a nurse found him in bed without a pulse or respirations. A second nurse confirmed he was gone. Hospice was called. A note entered that morning said the POA was aware of the death. An on-call nurse practitioner was reached at 4:10 a.m. and issued an order to release the body to the funeral home once hospice and family were ready.
The family was not ready. The family did not know.
The POA had been hospitalized and did not have access to a phone. Staff called the POA's number three times and got no answer. They did not call the second emergency contact, whose name and number were listed in the same record. They released the body anyway. The man was cremated.
Two days later, the family gathered and played the voicemail left on the POA's phone. That is how they found out.
A family member interviewed by inspectors on the day of the survey described what the voicemail said: the resident had passed away, had been sent to the funeral home, and had been cremated. She said neither she nor the rest of the family were given the opportunity to say goodbye. She said it was very upsetting.
She also pointed out something that made the staff's failure harder to explain away. When Resident C had fallen at an earlier date, the POA had not been reachable then either. Staff had known to call the second contact that time. They reached her. The system worked. Someone made a decision to use the backup number for a fall but not for a death.
The Director of Nursing, interviewed by inspectors at 1:01 in the afternoon on the day of the survey, acknowledged the failure directly. She said staff had tried the POA three times before releasing the body to the funeral home. She said staff had not tried to reach the second family member listed in the record. She said staff should have called all listed contact numbers and spoken with someone before releasing the body.
That did not happen.
Auburn Village's own policy, provided to inspectors by the Administrator at 3:20 that afternoon, stated the facility would promptly notify the resident's representative of changes in the resident's condition and status. Death is the most significant change in condition a resident can experience. The policy existed. Staff did not follow it.
The inspection, conducted on May 26, 2026, was a complaint investigation. Inspectors reviewed three residents' records and found this violation in one of them. The level of harm was classified as minimal harm or potential for actual harm, the lower end of the federal scale. Whether that classification accounts for the experience of a family who could not say goodbye, who had no chance to be present, who found out their relative had died and been cremated through a recorded phone message, is a question the inspection form does not answer.
Hospice admissions exist, in part, because families want to be there. The entire structure of end-of-life care at Auburn Village, the do-not-resuscitate order, the hospice enrollment, the named contacts and their ranked order in the file, was built around the understanding that this man's death was coming and that people who loved him wanted to be part of what happened. The record listed two contacts precisely because one person might not be reachable. That is what a backup contact is for.
Staff reached no one. They released the body.
The family member told inspectors that staff must have known to call the second contact, because they had done it before. That word, must, carries the weight of what she was left to conclude on her own, without explanation, without apology recorded in the inspection report, without any account of why the decision was made differently this time.
The Director of Nursing offered no explanation for why the second number went uncalled. The inspection report records what she said staff should have done. It does not record whether anyone at the facility has since spoken directly to the family about what happened and why.
The family heard the voicemail together. They heard that he had passed away. They heard that he had been sent to the funeral home. They heard that he had been cremated. None of them had said goodbye.
Full Inspection Report
The details above represent a summary of key findings. View the complete inspection report for Auburn Village from 2026-05-26 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: August 13, 2026 · Our methodology
AUBURN VILLAGE in AUBURN, IN was cited for immediate jeopardy violations during a health inspection on May 26, 2026.
The man, identified in inspection records only as Resident C, had been admitted to Auburn Village with hospice services.
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.