I first and foremost would like to extend my appreciation to all residents and families. I thank all of you for your patience during this time of isolation. I know how difficult absence from loved ones can be and I also must say that it is evident that you are prioritizing your loved ones safety over all else.
Universal Testing:
On Thursday July 9th, CVS/Omnicare Health conducted baseline universal testing on all PC residents and staff. It was so well attended that the day went longer than expected. However, we were able to accomplish our mission of testing all who were required to. The CVS representatives even commented on how well things went and that all the residents did a great job! So Kudos to all of you!
We received our results last week and I can confirm that we had all negative results. This is wonderful news as we can now move into the next phase of reopening! This is as long as we remain COVID free. In an effort to monitor the COVID free status, we will continue to require any new Residents or Staff to be tested for COVID prior to move in or hire. Many of the agencies that we work with also require staff to be tested on a weekly basis. In Personal Care, we continue to screen employees coming on and going off shift, and all residents are having temperature and oxygen saturation level checks every day.
Since testing has been completed and continued monitoring is in place, PC activities have started up once again. The residents have been thrilled to get out and socialize! They are still required to wear a mask when out of the apartment and social distancing is also in place during activities.
Visitation Guidelines:
We receive many calls and emails every day asking about visitation so I am excited to give good news! Effective Monday, July 27th we will be opening up visitations for the families of Personal Care residents in keeping with guidance of the Department of Human Services. Visitations must be conducted in a “neutral zone”, and with specified visiting hours. During this phase of reopening, we will hold visitations outside of the Personal Care/Skilled Nursing Entrance, which will need to be scheduled. There will be tables and chairs set up with social distancing in mind. We will require that visitors check in at the SNF entrance and get screened by WEL staff. Please keep the number of visitors to 2 per visit.
If you would like to reserve a visitation time slot, please visit the WEL website under the community updates page here: https://www.wel.org/community-updates/ and enter DTWesley as the password. There you will find a link for the Personal Care visitor sign up page. If you have any questions or need help with the sign up, please email Molly Sahner at msahner@wel.org or me at mminninger@wel.org
We look forward to seeing all of you again!
