After months of court battles and community outcry, the now-shuttered West Suburban and Weiss Memorial hospitals could soon have a new owner.
But questions remain about whether it’s possible to reopen the hospitals at all and, if so, if an organization affiliated with Insight Hospital & Medical Center in Bronzeville is the right operator to do it.
A September settlement agreement between the two business partners who owned Weiss, in Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood, and West Suburban, in Oak Park, when they closed — and who sued each other in court — paved the way for the potential sale of both hospitals. But reopening the long-troubled facilities would be an enormous, expensive endeavor for any new owner, and documents show Insight brings with it a questionable track record.
Insight Chicago, the nonprofit that owns the Bronzeville hospital, owed tens of millions of dollars to the state as of August, and the hospital has recorded financial losses, according to the state and tax documents. Despite the financial distress, the nonprofit Chicago hospital has continued to pay millions annually to a for-profit management and consulting company with ties to Insight.
Insight’s Chicago hospital has also been cited for numerous safety issues, records obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests show. In 2023, state inspectors found safety problems in its behavioral health unit that were severe enough to place the hospital in immediate jeopardy, a serious designation that can lead to a facility being cut off from Medicare. The safety issues were resolved, and the Chicago hospital remains open. But state inspectors flagged problems at another Insight-affiliated hospital in Ohio, and that hospital was ultimately terminated from the Medicare program and closed.
“They just don’t seem stable enough to run this system or provide capital,” said Dr. Vishnu Chundi, a longtime West Suburban physician and chair of the Chicago Medical Society’s Task Force to Restore Care at West Suburban Medical Center.
Insight leaders have not promised to reopen either Weiss or West Suburban. Rather, they are in the midst of a 90-day due diligence process to evaluate “the feasibility of a path forward for each hospital,” Atif Bawahab, chief strategy officer for Insight Health Systems, wrote in an email in response to Tribune questions. Insight Health Systems is a Michigan-based for-profit company. Bawahab is also president and CEO of Insight’s Chicago hospital.
“The reality is that, to date, no other party has stepped forward to undertake this comprehensive assessment and explore a potential path forward for these hospitals,” Bawahab said.
Insight takes the challenges it has already faced seriously and recognizes that financial sustainability and patient safety are “fundamental responsibilities,” Bawahab said.
“Our experience operating in Chicago has reinforced both the difficulty of restoring distressed hospitals and the importance of addressing their underlying financial, infrastructure, and operational needs,” he said.
Community members and leaders agree that they want the hospitals to reopen — bringing back jobs and care close to home.
But they disagree about whether Insight is the best organization to take on the task.
Earlier this month, state Senate President Don Harmon said he has “great reservations about Insight based on their record both in Illinois and other states.”
But outgoing U.S. Rep. Danny Davis, who lives a stone’s throw from West Suburban, said he’s open to giving Insight a chance.
“I haven’t heard anybody else saying they would want to do it, and given the fact that Insight believes that they can do it, I would certainly want to help them,” Davis said. “You always have some concern, but I wouldn’t say that any concern that I have would (lead me to) say, ‘Let’s not give them a try.’”
The Rev. Robin Hood, a leader of the Coalition to Save Safety Net Hospitals, said he admires Insight for stepping forward when no one else has.
“Insight is the only option. If they ever back out of it, I guarantee you nobody else is going to buy it,” Hood said of West Suburban.
Success and struggles
Insight is no stranger to taking over struggling safety-net hospitals in the Chicago area.
Insight Chicago swooped in to take over the historic Mercy Hospital in Bronzeville in 2021, buying it for $1 about a year after Trinity Health announced plans to close it. Trinity said the hospital had monthly operating losses of $4 million, and a need for another $100 million to maintain the aging facility.
A spokesperson said at the time that Insight was committed to stabilizing the hospital’s finances and restoring it as a teaching facility.
More than five years later, Insight has had successes and struggles.
On one hand, the hospital, which was renamed Insight Hospital and Medical Center, is still open, serving a largely Black community. It still runs an emergency department, and Insight has worked “to restore and expand clinical services, strengthen physician recruitment, and rebuild the hospital’s role as a provider of care for an underserved community,” Bawahab said.
Congressman Davis said Insight is “well on their way” and he’s a fan of Insight for the “courage they’ve shown in terms of trying to get Mercy back on track.”
Insight’s takeover of Mercy, however, has not been without its challenges.
The hospital has continued to lose money under Insight. In 2024, the hospital’s expenses exceeded its income by $28.9 million, and the year before by $42.8 million, according to tax documents.
Insight is also one of a number of safety-net hospitals that owe money to the state. As of August, it owed $48 million in loan payments to Illinois.
The state loaned Insight that money because of problems related to its electronic health records and billing systems and because Medicare was withholding payments after it previously overpaid the hospital, according to documents obtained from the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services through a Freedom of Information Act request.
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Insight was not in compliance with the terms of its repayment agreement with the state as of August, according to the state.
Despite these financial struggles, Insight’s Chicago hospital — owned by a nonprofit — has been paying millions of dollars a year to the for-profit Insight Management and Consulting Services for management services. The Chicago hospital paid the management and consulting firm more than $12 million a year in 2022, 2023 and 2024, according to tax records.
A number of the leaders of Insight’s nonprofit Chicago hospital are also leaders of the for-profit Insight Management and Consulting Services.
The president and CEO of Insight’s Chicago hospital, Bawahab, is also listed as secretary of Insight Management & Consulting Services in Michigan, according to the company’s most recent annual report filed with the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs. The Chicago hospital’s chief operating officer and board chair, Ali Madha, is also listed as treasurer of the for-profit management and consulting business.
Bawahab acknowledges that Insight has faced financial pressures. But he noted that safety-net hospitals like Insight serve a disproportionately high number of patients who are on Medicaid, are underinsured or uninsured.
He said it shouldn’t be surprising that Insight’s Chicago hospital has been operating in the red, given how much money it was losing each month under previous ownership, and given the costs of restarting services, recruiting physicians and employees, rebuilding programs and addressing infrastructure problems.
Bawahab disputed the state’s position that Insight Hospital & Medical Center has not been in compliance with its repayment agreement for the $48 million it owes the state. He said Insight has been talking with the state about potentially setting up a new repayment agreement “that supports both our obligations and the hospital’s long-term financial sustainability.”
“We recognize the importance of meeting our financial obligations to the state and maintaining a constructive partnership with state agencies,” Bawahab said.
He said the millions of dollars paid to the for-profit management and consulting business was “approved through the hospital’s governance process by a disinterested board and the compensation was determined to be fair market value based on an independent third-party assessment.”
As for the leadership overlap between the Insight for-profit and nonprofit organizations, he said: “We recognize the importance of transparency and appropriate safeguards whenever related organizations have overlapping leadership or business relationships. Such arrangements must be evaluated and approved through appropriate governance processes, with attention to conflicts of interest, the interests of the nonprofit organization, and applicable legal and regulatory requirements.”
Bawahab said that Insight’s preference would be to establish a separate nonprofit organization, governed by an independent board with community representation, to ultimately acquire the hospitals. He said, however, no final decision has been made about how exactly ownership would be structured or what entity would buy the hospitals. Insight plans to evaluate a potential acquisition of both the hospital operations and the hospital real estate.
Safety concerns
In addition to financial struggles, Insight’s Chicago hospital has run into a number of issues related to safety and patient rights, according to documents obtained by the Tribune through the Freedom of Information Act.
Since Insight Chicago bought the hospital in 2021, the state health department has identified problems during inspections more than half a dozen times — including issues with infection control and prevention, failure to follow the process for investigating and reporting abuse and fire safety, among others.
In 2023, state inspectors found problems in the behavioral health unit that were so severe that the hospital was placed in immediate jeopardy — a serious designation that can precede a hospital losing its ability to bill Medicare. It would be almost impossible for a safety-net hospital that loses its ability to bill Medicare to stay open.
Inspectors found that patient rooms in the unit weren’t safe for individuals at risk of suicide attempts. The unit had equipment and fixtures that patients could have potentially used to try to end their lives, inspectors found. Insight worked to address the problem, and the immediate jeopardy designation was removed.
Bawahab said Insight takes safety “extremely seriously” and has worked with the state health department and accrediting organizations to address problems and strengthen clinical and operational processes. He said some of the issues identified by state inspectors “involved inherited building conditions, fire-safety infrastructure, and deferred maintenance.”
Though Insight’s Chicago hospital was able to keep its Medicare status, an Ohio hospital wasn’t as fortunate.
Insight Hospital & Medical Center Trumbull, in Warren, Ohio, was terminated from the Medicare program in October 2025, about a year after Insight Foundation of Trumbull took over the hospital, according to a letter to Insight from the Ohio Department of Health.
Insight first closed the Ohio hospital in March 2025, and then in October 2025, Insight reopened just the emergency department of the Trumbull hospital. The Ohio Department of Health inspected the hospital after the emergency department reopened, but found a number of problems.
Inspectors found that the heat was not fully working. Inspectors also said the hospital failed to follow requirements that it integrate emergency services with other hospital departments, according to documents from the Ohio Department of Health.
The Insight Foundation of Trumbull closed the hospital again in late November and surrendered its state hospital license earlier this year as part of a settlement agreement with the Ohio Department of Health.
Bawahab noted that Insight took over the Ohio hospital after its previous owner, Steward Health Care, filed for bankruptcy, and at a time when the hospital was at risk of closure. Once involved, Insight “encountered substantial operational and financial challenges.”
Insight faced challenges at that hospital with vendor contracts, access to data, Medicaid billing and “the costs and terms of services necessary to maintain operations,” he said.
A second Ohio hospital, Insight Rehabilitation Hospital Hillside, also closed in March 2025, after it was acquired from Steward by an Insight nonprofit organization. A note on the hospital’s website blames “additional abrupt developments in Steward Health Care’s bankruptcy proceedings and the mounting lack of transferred dollars owed for healthcare services delivered to patients at Trumbull and Hillside hospitals.” The Hillside hospital also remains closed, according to the Ohio Department of Health.
“Our experience in Ohio has reinforced the importance of understanding these issues before committing to ongoing operations,” Bawahab said.
A challenge for any new operator
Any new operator of West Suburban and/or Weiss would face a number of daunting hurdles to reopening.
For one, Weiss lost its ability to participate in Medicare last year, and West Suburban was terminated from the Medicare program last month. Weiss also recently lost its state hospital license.
Any new owner would have to regain that license and the ability to bill Medicare and Medicaid in order to run a functioning hospital.
“I think that process is going to be tedious,” said Emily Stiehl, a clinical associate professor of health policy and administration at University of Illinois Chicago.
Often, when a new owner comes in to save a struggling hospital, that hospital is still open, Stiehl said. It would be challenging, in a number of ways, for a new owner to reopen a hospital that had already been closed for some time, Stiehl said.
Any new owner would have to work to restore trust with staff, if it hopes to bring any of them back, Stiehl said. West Suburban formally laid off more than 500 workers this summer, after they had been furloughed for months.
A new owner would also have to bring all parts of the hospital back up to code, Stiehl said.
And then there’s the money.
“It requires the acquiring organization then to (front) all the costs without any revenue coming in,” Stiehl said.
“I think this reopening of hospitals is not impossible, but … most of the hospitals that have closed in Chicago were converted for other purposes, so it does not seem like the typical trend,” Stiehl said.
Finally, the Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board must typically approve deals to sell hospitals in Illinois. It’s an approval process that’s faced scrutiny in recent years. A recent Tribune investigation found that the board missed potential red flags as it approved the sale of Weiss and West Suburban to Resilience Healthcare in 2022.
Illinois requires that those who wish to buy hospitals offer proof to the board that they’re “fit, willing and able.” The board has previously said it is required to approve changes in ownership once the application material is “deemed complete.”
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When asked earlier this year to clarify what power the board had to decide if potential buyers were “fit, willing and able,” the board did not directly respond, instead saying it approves proposals “if the information submitted meets the requirements set forth in the law and rules.”
Though some community members are rooting for Insight, others are worried that Insight won’t do any better than the previous owner.
Bishop Dwight Gunn has been pushing for months for West Suburban to reopen, but he said it’s difficult to imagine how Insight could save West Suburban or Weiss, given its existing financial challenges.
“It is asinine in my opinion to believe Insight can do this work,” said Gunn, of Heritage International Christian Church in Austin. “They have no history to suggest we should trust them.”
Bawahab said he understands the skepticism.
“We are not asking the communities served by West Suburban and Weiss to disregard the past, nor are we suggesting that restoring these institutions will be easy,” Bawahab said. “We see a responsibility to help determine whether West Suburban and Weiss can be preserved.”