For those who work in healthcare, illness in the workplace can be a bigger concern than many other jobs. And one nursing home employee in Elkhart had quite a scare this week.

On Sunday, a certified nursing assistant, or CNA, at Golden Living Center was diagnosed with C-DIF, that’s short for clostridium difficile.

C-DIF is a serious bacterial infection which had the employee hospitalized for several days. After three nights in the hospital, that 26-year-old employee is home recovering.

What he thought was a bad case of the flu, turned out to be something much more serious. A family member says he dropped about 20 pounds in the last four weeks. The family thinks the illness could have been prevented.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), clostridium difficile, or C-DIF is most common in the elderly or people with weakened immune systems. So when a healthy, 26-year-old CNA was diagnosed with C-DIF, those closest to him asked questions.

The employee is home recovering now and Newscenter 16 spoke with a family member, who asked not to be identified. “This could have been a lot worse and it could get a lot worse,” says a family member of the employee, who asked to remain anonymous. “I think it was general working on the patients, it coulda been as simple as the resident went to the bathroom, didn't wash her hands, touched something else.”

C-DIF is spread through bacteria in the feces of infected people. The family believes a patient at Golden Living Center may have passed on C-DIF. They feel that patient was not properly quarantined at the time of their illness.

“My biggest concern is that I know some of the people that work at the nursing home. I know that the young adults have been exposed to this, I know that they were told that there wasn't any of this, you don't expect a young adult to get something like this,” explains the family member.

Newscenter 16 went to Golden Living Center for a comment. Officials asked not to go on camera, but gave a phone interview. The executive director admits one of their patients had C-DIF months ago, but says the situation was handled appropriately

“At this point, I have no active cases [C-DIF] in my building. I did have one resident that had been previously treated, but in last six months we have had no active cases of C-DIF in our facility,” says Carol Simmons, Executive Director of the Golden Living Center.

“I feel really bad for this employee and certainly if it is a result of something that happened in our facility, obviously we're going to be prudent in helping take care of that,” adds Simmons.

The employee's family says they’ve notified the Indiana State Health Department. As of Wednesday night, the health department has not returned Newscenter 16’s calls for a comment on this story.

“He's just hoping for the best, he's really young and he doesn't need this,” adds the family member.

Simmons says they’re not required to report this incident to the state. She says they're only required to report these situations if it's considered an "outbreak,” which is defined as 10% of the nursing home population.

Officials say now is a good time to remind everyone about the importance of washing your hands well and often.