Bucks County nursing home had record of safety violations before deadly explosion killed 3
The facility was issued $418,000 in federal fines since 2023, the highest in the Philly region.
The nursing home in Bucks County where three people died last month in a natural gas explosion had a long track record of safety violations.
The exact cause of the explosion has yet to be determined, but state regulators cited the 174-bed Bristol Township facility for numerous safety violations in the three years leading up to the tragedy. The nursing home, which changed owners three weeks before the accident, was cited for over 70 health and fire safety violations since 2023, and fined more than any nursing home in the Philly area.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) slapped a total of $418,000 fines on the facility, then named Silver Lake Healthcare Center, between 2023 and 2025, more than any other facility in Delaware, Chester, Montgomery, Bucks, and Philadelphia Counties. Major fines were issued after a resident overdosed on illegal narcotics on four separate occasions. The new owners renamed it Bristol Health & Rehab Center in 2025.
The Pennsylvania Department of Health conducts inspections of nursing homes on behalf of the federal government every 15 months, said Neil Ruhland, a spokesman for the Pennsylvania Department of Health. Facilities that repeatedly fail to comply with safety standards can face penalties including fines and, in rare cases, termination from Medicare and Medicaid, he said.
Across the region, a total of $5.3 million in fines have been issued to nursing homes since 2023. Nearly half the region’s nursing homes had fines, and six-figure penalties are not uncommon in the region. More than 22% of the 85 facilities fined had penalties greater than $100,000.
Fines for fire safety
In January 2023, when the facility was known as Silver Lake Healthcare Center, it was cited for a fire safety deficiency during a routine inspection. According to the report, the facility failed to maintain exit signage requirements and fire sprinkler systems. The facility also did not maintain corridor doors, which help resist the passage of smoke, on two floors, and failed to provide the required smoke barrier partitions on two floors.
These violations led to a single fire safety citation at the nursing home between 2023 and 2025. Other nursing homes in Southeastern Pennsylvania had far more, including one with 60 fire-safety citations during the same period.
Two months before the explosion, in October 2025, the state completed another inspection of the building. Some of the problems from 2023 were addressed, but not all, the report shows.
The center again failed to provide required smoke barrier partitions on two of three floors. The nursing home also failed to provide an accurate floor plan that inspectors could carry during a building safety review, failed to maintain portable fire extinguishers on one floor, and did not properly secure a room where oxygen cylinders were stored with smoke-tight doors.
The inspection report indicates that the center had requested a Fire Safety Evaluation System (FSES), which according to CMS, “may be applicable when a facility has multiple deficiencies that may be cost-prohibitive or infeasible to correct.”
Silver Lake Healthcare Center did not respond to The Inquirer’s request for comment.
Citations for narcotics, mental health
In addition to fire safety violations, the facility has received a high number of health citations — a total of 71 issued by CMS over the past three years.
A resident overdosed on illegal narcotics on four separate occasions during a seven-month period from December 2023 to July 2024, according to a September 2024 inspection report. One time, the resident reported to investigators buying an unidentified narcotic from another resident of the facility in one incident. On another occasion, the patient obtained fentanyl that led to another overdose and a trip to an emergency department.
Despite the patient’s “history of heroin and fentanyl abuse,” according to the report, “there was no documented evidence that a consistent psychiatric, psychological counseling to address resident’s addiction was provided.”
The facility also failed to adequately supervise a resident diagnosed with schizoaffective and bipolar disorders, according to an October 2024 inspection report. An interview with a nurse aide found that the resident left the facility at 11:30 p.m. Staff were unaware until notified by police hours later.