Brain-injured woman wandered from Iowa facility before being found at Nebraska truck stop

Yahoo

06-06-2025

Community NeuroRehab at Glen Oaks is a five-bed residential care facility in Coralville, Iowa. (Photo via Google Earth)
A female resident of a Coralville care facility wandered from the home earlier this year and was later found at a Nebraska truck stop 265 miles away.
The incident occurred in January at Community NeuroRehab's Glen Oaks facility in Coralville, a state-licensed, five-bed residential care facility for people with mental or developmental disabilities.
Newly disclosed state records show that a worker at the facility told state inspectors on May 14, 2025, that she was working the morning shift at 9:40 a.m. on Jan. 2, 2025, when she checked on a resident who was due for her medication.
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The resident, who had previously been diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury, dementia and psychological issues, was not in her room. The worker discovered a bent window screen underneath the bed, and in looking out the window she saw a footprint on top of an air-conditioning unit directly under the window. It was snowing at the time, and the temperature was around 22 degrees.
The staff then launched a search for the woman in the community. Shortly after 5 p.m., the resident's mother called the facility to report that her daughter had been found, confused and frightened, 265 miles away at a truck stop in Gretna, Nebraska.
According to state inspectors' reports, the woman had 'hitched a ride from a semi-driver who drove her to Nebraska.'
In their written report, state inspectors said the woman had 'engaged in some type of sexual activity,' as determined by the medical provider she saw on Jan. 3, 2025, 'resulting in a very traumatic 24 hours.' A review of lab work revealed that testing for sexually transmitted infections was negative, the inspectors reported.
A worker at the home allegedly told inspectors she had been trained to check and make sure each resident was present at the beginning of her shift but acknowledged she had not done so on Jan. 2, 2025.
Inspectors concluded the resident had walked 2.3 miles through a mostly residential neighborhood to an interstate highway and then hitched a ride where she appeared to have been picked up by the driver of a semi-truck.
The Iowa Department of Inspections, Appeals and Licensing recently fined Community NeuroRehab $3,000 for resident-safety violations related to the incident.
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