Joseph Biedermann woke up to the sound of beeping hospital monitors, unsure of what was happening. He’d been unconscious for three days.
“That beeping and the hum and whoosh of machines still haunts me,” he said. “The first thing I saw was the fluorescent lights, then the IV and bed railings came into focus, and I realized I was in bad shape. But I was alive, and that was something.”
He has no memory of the accident that nearly killed him.
“But I remember the hospital. Well, I remember Sacred Heart. I don’t recall being at St. Joseph’s the night of the accident. They transferred me from St. Joe’s to Sacred Heart,” he said.
A hospital closure notice posted on the door to the Emergency Room at HSHS St. Joseph’s on March 19.
Audrey Korte
Biedermann said it took awhile for him to piece together what happened.
He and his wife, Erin, were traveling on Highway 178 on their way back to Chippewa Falls from Eau Claire on Feb. 16, 2007, when another driver side-swiped their car, he said.
“We ended up rolling off the side of the road before hitting a tree,” he said. “My wife broke a few bones. She was banged up, but she wasn’t as bad as me. I was covered in bruises and lacerations. I broke my leg, hip, arm, wrist, collarbone, four ribs, my foot and eye socket. I was cut up pretty good, too. I had something like 60 stitches all over.”
Biedermann said he and his wife had only been living in Chippewa Falls for five months when the accident happened. He’d never visited either hospital before the night of the accident.
“I will never forget the care I received, first at St. Joe’s then at Sacred Heart. Believe me, it was lengthy. I spent quite a while in the hospital and was back at both HSHS locations many times that year for follow-ups and aftercare. I was worried that, you know, I might lose my ability to walk, but after a lot of work I recovered.”
Coming back to life
Biedermann said people often talk about gratitude when they survive something devastating. Now he understands why.
”I don’t think I really got it until years later. My wife got sick with cancer in 2018, and she passed away in 2020,” he said. “Now I realize that St. Joseph’s and Sacred Heart gave me all those extra years with her. There’s not a day that goes by where I don’t thank God for that. We both lived. We went on vacation together. We danced at my son’s wedding, thanks to them.”
Rick Flynn said he, too, is grateful for the lifesaving care received at HSHS hospitals.
Flynn started having serious health problems in 2015. For seven years he received treatment at HSHS St. Joseph’s and Sacred Heart from its wound care clinic among other hospital services.
Teri Ouimette stands with Rick Flynn outside of Chippewa Falls Main Street in July 2022.
Flynn said he dealt with sepsis and toe amputation in January 2017, then in November of that year he had a leg amputation as part of ongoing health issues.
In November 2017, he was at his brother’s house when he fell backward. His step-dad, who lived one block away, came over to bring Flynn home.
“I couldn’t get up, so Jeff called the fire department and the guys came to the house, and by the time we got to St. Joseph’s I was clinically dead. The ER, they worked on me for 10 to 15 minutes in the ER to get my heartbeat back,” Flynn said.
Key developments in Chippewa Valley closures of HSHS and Prevea facilities
Flynn was transferred to Sacred Heart Hospital, where he coded again. That was the night they amputated his leg, Flynn said.
“St. Joe’s saved my life. Sacred Heart saved my life. I’m here today because of them,” he said.
Flynn said in the days after losing his leg, he struggled emotionally about his health problems.
“The nursing staff was great. I went through a little bout of depression because of everything that happened and then a couple of nurses kind of got me out of my funk there. I still keep in touch with them today,” Flynn said.
A prayer for healing sits outside of the main entrance to HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital on March 17.
Audrey Korte
‘A soulless day’
Rod Stetzer was a patient at HSHS Sacred Heart in late January. He was there the day that HSHS announced it would close its two hospitals in the region, along with multiple Prevea Health facilities.
“What struck me that day was I was still needing help. And everybody there was very professional. But when you looked in their eyes, you could tell that they were crushed. It was kind of a soulless day,” he said. “Their bodies were there and they were doing the right things, they were taking care of the patients, but their minds were elsewhere.”
Stetzer said he’s been back and forth to HSHS Sacred Heart numerous times for health problems since 2015.
Stetzer
“They took really good care of me and always got me home,” he said. “They took me in and gave me my first COVID shot, too. And at the time that was like gold. You couldn’t get them anywhere. And HSHS stood up and gave all the shots in a church in the village of Lake Hallie, and I’ll always thank them for that, because it gave me the opportunity to get that shot at the height of the pandemic.”
Stetzer said he thinks a lack of planning has come back to hurt the hospitals.
“I love the city of Chippewa Falls. I lived and worked there for 40 years. I love the city government in Chippewa Falls, but no one had planned in advance. Or maybe they did, and I don’t know it. But I question the planning departments of both cities, of Chippewa Falls and Eau Claire, who do not have a contingency book for health care and probably not having a contingency book of other major industries that may go out of the area. Because there was nothing like that. Everybody was flat footed,” he said.
Stetzer said he’s worried people will die as a result of the hospital closures.
“There is no way around it. This will cost lives. This is deadly,” he said.
Kelsey Manquist, Joe and Erin’s eldest daughter, said she worries about the cost of the hospital closures.
“If St. Joseph’s wasn’t there, what would have happened the night of the accident? If the ambulance drivers were overwhelmed with calls and making trips all night to Eau Claire, would they have gotten him out in time?,” Manquist said. “They stabilized dad in Chippewa at St. Joe’s before bringing him to Sacred Heart. There’s a hundred different ways that night could have gone wrong, and I worry that this will be the future now for many people in Chippewa and Eau Claire with the two hospitals out of action.”
‘Hospitals are about the people, not the place’
Manquist lives in Menomonie. She said her dad moved in with her after her mom died.
“I will never forget Chippewa Falls, the first responders and the hospital for taking care of my folks,” Manquist said. “Every time mom and I used to drive by St. Joe’s, she’d say, ‘That’s where me and your dad, we renewed our contract on life together.’ She used to tell me about how she prayed for dad there with the chaplain when she was being treated after the accident. She always said, ‘God answered.’”
Manquist wonders how many other people have similar stories.
EMTs place a Chippewa Falls patient into an ambulance in 2010 after an accident on County I and Commerce Parkway.
“I think of all the life, and death, at both places. I think of the last words spoken and the babies born and the joy when people learned their loved ones would live or that their cancer was regressing, and it breaks my heart. St. Joe’s gave me my dad back. Sacred Heart kept him alive and literally nursed him back to health. I will never forget that. I will be forever thankful,” she said. “These hospitals are about the people, not the place. And taking that away, that community, is horribly sad and wrong.”
Stetzer said he feels sorry for all the patients and the staff who will lose their health care home because of the HSHS closures.
“They deserve better — the staff, doctors and nurses and EMTs. We all do. I am not impressed with HSHS, by which I mean the people in charge in Illinois, not the local workers who were blindsided,” Stetzer said.
He said the actions of HSHS regarding the announcement are “inexcusable.”
“How arrogant they are there. They are not only throwing dirt back at the patients that they’ve had through the years, but their very workers, hard working people who tried to save lives,” he said. “I’m just extremely disappointed that they didn’t take leadership on this. Didn’t take responsibility. They were not transparent. They just came up with mumbling word salad, not explaining why they’re pulling out and never giving a good definition of why they can’t compete here.”
EAU CLAIRE — Reverend Lawrence Dunklee, MDiv, MA, has been named System Director of Ethics for Hospital Sisters Health System (HSHS). HSHS is a 13-hospital system based in Springfield, Ill, of which Sacred Heart Hospital is a member.
Hundreds of well wishers turned out Sunday afternoon to wish Dave Fish well on his retirement.
Porter Reid Boos showed up an hour and a half late to the New Year’s Eve party. Now he’ll have to wait a full 365 days before he can celebrate his first New Year’s holiday.
Some people have a trial by fire. Joan Coffman, president and CEO of HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls, had a trial by water. Lots and lots of water.
For the ninth year, HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital called on Chippewa Valley Correctional Treatment Facility inmates to push brooms and hoist shovels to clean up the hospital’s campus.
A Green Bay-based health care company on Wednesday began operating what had been the HSHS Medical Group-Family Health Associates facility in Chippewa Falls.
HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls helped its marketing firm win several advertising awards at this year’s Hospital Marketing National Conference in Atlanta, Georgia.
Stacey Prazuch looked like she was about to walk on the moon.
HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital’s L.E. Phillips-Libertas Treatment Center will be holding a session on challenging assumptions 3-5 p.m. Tuesday, Dec. 6.
Sister Frances Elizabeth Schmitz, 94, of the Hospital Sisters of St. Francis died on Thursday at St. Francis Convent, Springfield, Ill.
The 46th annual Partners of HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital Charity Ball, G.I. Jive, a 1940s end-of-war celebration, brought nearly 180 community members to Avalon Hotel & Convention Center on Saturday, May 20. It takes a village to put on this type of event — Dave Raihle donated a number of items to give the Ball a realistic feel, including a tank that was placed outside of the front door. Committee members also hit up the Chippewa Herald for articles about the war from the 1940s, and the historical society donated items among other community partners. Money raised during the event will help educate the community and reduce the stigma of mental illness.
HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls — along with HSHS Sacred Heart Hospital in Eau Claire — are implementing a “workforce shift.”
Chippewa County reported its first COVID-19-related death on Oct. 12. In the 63 days since then, the county has totaled 61 deaths from the virus, nearly one a day.
EAU CLAIRE — HSHS Sacred Heart Hospital and its physician partner, Prevea Health, began administering the first round of COVID-19 vaccines allotted to them by the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS) for frontline health care workers.
Prevea Health, HSHS Sacred Heart Hospital and HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital are pleased to announce the upcoming launch of a 3-D and digital, mobile mammography unit to provide residents in rural areas greater access to breast health screenings.
A Chippewa Falls-based treatment center has received a $1 million federal grant to combat the rising opioid crisis in four western Wisconsin counties.
When L.E. Phillips-Libertas Treatment Center admitted its first patient on July 5, 1977, it offered treatment primarily to people with alcoholism.
In honor of the Feast of St. Francis, HSHS Sacred Heart Hospital in Eau Claire and HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls hosted two “Blessing of the Animals” public events on Sunday.
HSHS Sacred Heart Hospital in Eau Claire and HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls have announced the appointment of John Wagner as president and CEO of both hospitals.
20 past photos from HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls
HSHS St. Joseph’s Foundation’s Charity Ball event raised money throughout the years to support services of the hospital and L.E. Phillips-Libertas Treatment Center.
RN and divisional director of emergency services for HSHS Sacred Heart and St. Joseph’s hospitals Robin Schultz, served donuts in 2019 to colleagues to show appreciation.
From the archives, Sister Francis Elizabeth Schmitz, left, and Deanne Rubenzer, reminisce in at office at St. Joseph’s Hospital. Sr. Francis, a St. Joseph’s Hospital administrator from 1982 through 2005. Sr. Francis died in 2017.
Mike Van Duyse, resident of Chippewa Falls and husband of Alyssa Van Duyse, was featured in an advertisement for HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in the mid-2010s. The Van Duyse family trusted the skilled colleagues at the hospital and had all procedures performed at St. Joseph’s until it was no longer possible.
For several years in a row, Alyssa Van Duyse gathered a group of community members to go caroling through the halls of HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital on Christmas. Many patients expressed their appreciation.
Joan Coffman was instrumental in getting a state-of-the-art, 25,600 square-foot medical office building constructed on the hospital’s campus. The building, located on the former site of the St. Francis Convent, houses HSHS Medical Group-Family Health, hospital outpatient Rehabilitation Services, hospital Occupational Health and Medicine and a retail pharmacy. It opened in February of 2015.
Singers from McDonell high school performed during the 2013 HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital Love Lights celebration.
Students who took part in the first week of McDonell’s Student Ambassadors orientation pose in July of 2015 for a picture in front of HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital.
Gail Sullivan, a Registered Nurse and house supervisor at HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls, studies the latest reports while working in a mock hospital’s emergency operations center during the mass casualty exercise. Sullivan was one of more than 75 Wisconsin healthcare professionals who trained at the Center for Domestic Preparedness on advance disaster response skills in March of 2015.
Stacey Prazuch, a surgical nurse at HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital, donned a Level C splash suit used to decontaminate patients who come to the emergency room after any sort of contamination. Prazuch said it was warm inside the suit, but it wasn’t unlike the orthopedic hood she wears in surgery. “You become good at lip reading,” she said of wearing the suits in 2014.
Caleb Brown
A Chippewa County Hospital certificate to the hospital sisters of the Third Order of St. Francis St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls is seen from 1970.
Audrey Korte
Deanne Rubenzer smiles as she presents a plaque to former St. Joseph’s CEO Dave Fish at his retirement party in December of 2010 at Lake Wissota Golf Course. Looking on are Fish’s wife Diane, their grandchildren, and others from St. Joe’s.
A physician at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls helps a patient with cardiopulmonary rehabilitation therapy in July of 2012.
Sister Frances Elizabeth Schmitz stands at the groundbreaking ceremony for HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital on May 21, 1973.
In honor of the Feast of St. Francis, HSHS Sacred Heart Hospital in Eau Claire and HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital in Chippewa Falls hosted two “Blessing of the Animals” public events in October of 2022. Fr. John Schultz was one of two priests who oversaw the services, blessing the pets individually.
From left, mother Amber Hitz, Peyton Taylor Thompson and father Jacob Thompson are pictured at HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital on Jan. 1, 2018. Thompson was the first baby born at the hospital in 2018.
Jill Cooper, an RN at St. Joseph’s Hospital, takes out debrillator paddles from what’s called a “crash cart” in the hospital’s Intensive Care Unit in 2005. The cart is used when a patient has a heart attack at the hospital.
Wendy Lutz, 59, of Lake Hallie, sought out coronary calcium screening at St. Joseph’s Hospital, one of the only facilities in the Chippewa Valley to offer the screening. The 2014 procedure lasted no more than five minutes and within 20 minutes Lutz had the results – a clean bill of health. No calcium deposits were found in Lutz’s coronary arteries. It was quite a relief considering her family history.
Partners of HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital hosted its 45th annual Charity Ball in May of 2016 at the Avalon Conference Center this Saturday. That year’s New Orleans-inspired theme was “Laissez les bon temps rouler” (Let the good times roll). It was based off the famous Bourbon Street and included dueling pianos and jazz street performers. Partners hold the ball each year to recognize current donors and raise money for the hospital.
Mike Erickson, doctor of physical therapy at HSHS St. Joseph’s Hospital, and the Athlete’s in Motion founder, uses an iPad to video Bobbi Burgess’ movements in October of 2015. Burgess, a high school athlete from Cadott, said she was noticeably stronger after going through the eight-week program.
Key developments in Chippewa Valley closures of HSHS and Prevea facilities
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