North-side nursing home to convert into drug-treatment center

A company that owns Capitol Village Healthcare, a 52-bed nursing home on the north side of Indianapolis, plans to renovate the property into a drug-recovery center for adults.

The owner, Fishers-based Chosen Healthcare, filed an application with the Indiana Department of Homeland Security to remodel 17,060 square feet of the building at 2926 N. Capitol Ave.

The company said it was still working to secure necessary approvals and had not finalized a timeline for the project.

The nursing home, plagued by poor ratings from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and private reviewers, closed earlier this year. The company has filed a “public notice of closure” on its website, saying it stopped participating in the Medicare program on July 31. No other details were provided.

“All former residents have been safely moved to alternative nursing homes that were identified after working with residents and their families to select new locations based on individual needs,” Michael Feder, counsel for Chosen Healthcare, said in an email to IBJ. “We take pride in all our nursing facilities, which provide high-quality care and focus on the goal of getting our short-term and long-term residents back to enjoying their lives fully.”

Chosen Healthcare operates 19 nursing homes and rehabilitation facilities in Indiana, Iowa and Texas, according to its website.

Cooler Design Inc. of Indianapolis is the project architect for the Capitol Village project. The application did not include any drawings or budget figures, or list services that would be provided at the drug recovery center.

“It is our hope that the new facility will help address a pressing health problem and offer services and hope to people that desperately need it,” Feder said. “Specifically, we are considering providing a safe and secure residential setting for patients who have faced their addiction and now are learning how to maintain sobriety and lead their life in recovery. We are partnering with Hickory House, an experienced rehab treatment provider, to create plans for a facility that will be a professionally run and incorporate the best practices of the industry to ensure both high-quality care and respect for local communities.”

If the state approves the renovation to a drug-recovery center, it would mark the latest in a groundswell of new addiction-treatment facilities in Indiana, which has been ravaged by the opioid crisis. Currently, 165 providers are certified to operate outpatient addiction treatment services across the state—up 67% from 2009.

Another 95 providers are certified to offer inpatient treatment, up 25% over the same period.

But those figures tell only part of the story. Each certified provider can operate multiple locations, and the number of actual locations providing addiction treatment services in Indiana today is 464. State officials could not immediately say how that compares to five or 10 years ago.

Capitol Village is near the intersection of West 30^th Street and North Capitol Avenue, about three blocks west of the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. It is surrounded on several sides by single-family homes.

The nursing home received a rating of “poor” in U.S. News & World Report’s latest ratings guide, based on a low level of nurse staffing, poor health inspection ratings, worse-than-average medical care, and higher-than-average safety violations in the past three years.

Capitol Village was first approved to provide Medicare and Medicaid services in 2002. According to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, it received only one star out of five possible stars in the CMS ratings.