Elderly Woman Suffering From Dementia Found Dead At SF General Hospital Building

An elderly woman with dementia, who was reported missing 10 days ago, was found dead in a stairwell at a San Francisco hospital campus Wednesday.

Ruby Anderson’s body was found by an engineer around 1 p.m. EDT in the power plant building on the grounds of Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center, said Rachael Kagan, spokesperson for the San Francisco Department of Public Health, Buzzfeed News reported.

"We don't know how this woman gained access to the area," Kagan said, adding the building where the body was found was locked and did not house patients. “We are very concerned how this could have happened."

Anderson, 75, was reported missing from the hospital's mental health center May 20, family members told MyNetwork TV-affiliated KRON4. Reports suggested an autopsy was pending.

The incident was being investigated by the city's Department of Public Health, the San Francisco Police Department and the San Francisco Sheriff's Department.

"Did she have a stroke or fell? I don't know what happened," Charlene Roberts, her daughter, told KRON4.

Roberts said the family almost hired an investigator after her mother went missing. She added she saw her mother last during a visit to the San Francisco General mental health facility on Mother’s Day.

In a similar incident, in 2013, a missing woman’s body was found in a stairway on the same hospital.

The body of 57-year-old Lynne Spalding was found during a routine stairwell check on Oct. 8, 2013, seventeen days after she disappeared from her room.

Her family got a $3 million settlement paid mostly by the city and the University of California as its staff was involved in her care.

The officials did not find any connection between the two incidents, Kagan said, referring to the Spalding case as a “terrible tragedy.”

“We have made many, many changes since that time and we have no reason to believe that this case and that case are connected,” she added. “There were a wide variety of corrections put in place by federal regulars and have been in place ever since.”

“With Lynne Spalding we knew she was a patient and we were looking for her,” Kagan said, claiming she did not know if Anderson was a patient.