‘These are unprecedented times’
Long-term care facilities off limits to all visitors, province has announced
Near the end of last week, long-term care facilities in southwestern Nova Scotia were among those bracing themselves for the coronavirus.
“These are unprecedented times,” said Anna Babin, administrator at The Meadows Home for Special Care in Yarmouth. “Our management team has been huddling every morning. Things are just changing every day.”
Contacted on March 13 — four days after the province announced visitor restrictions for long-term care facilities and two days before banning visitors completely from these facilities — Babin said they were working with their partners and had tried to be pro-active in dealing with the situation.
At The Meadows, Babin said they were, among other things, looking to restructure their recreation activities, recognizing that while social interaction is important for residents, these are not normal circumstances.
“It’s a bit surreal,” she said. “We’re being exposed to a lot of information ... I think it’s impacting everybody.”
At Tideview Terrace in Digby, they, too, have been working closely with their partners, said administrator Debra Boudreau, “just trying to stay on top of this evolving and emerging scenario.”
Evidence of how evolving it is came this past weekend when the province announced the first three presumptive cases of COVID-19 in Nova Scotia. Among other measures, the province now says no one will be allowed to visit longterm care facilities. Previously, the restriction for nursing home visits had been limited to people who had travelled outside Canada in the last 14 days.
Contacted last Friday, Boudreau said a fundraiser involving residents that was planned for early April has been put on hold.
“They’ll be sad that that’s not going to happen, but we’re communicating that it’s not cancelled, it’s simply postponed,” she said. “We’ll postpone it to the fall. We’ll re-evaluate then.”
Asked how residents were dealing with all the talk of COVID-19, Boudreau said, “I think they are very aware of infections ... going through flu season every year, the precautions that we take around that, and they’re also very aware that the COVID-19 virus is affecting their cohort, so they want us to do all we can to keep them safe, as well as keep ourselves safe.”
Babin, speaking of the coronavirus outbreak more generally, emphasized the importance on everyone doing their part to help prevent the virus’s spread, including frequent and proper hand-washing, coughing in your sleeve or on your shoulder instead of your hands, etc.
Aside from those simple but crucial health practices, Babin hopes people will find a way to keep their spirits up in the midst of a tense situation.
“I don’t have the answer,” she said. “We really need to support each other. There’s going to be times that it’s extremely difficult and there’s going to be times that you just have to look at and practise gratitude for just the little things and sometimes keep a sense of humour.”
Easier said than done, she admits, given the gravity of the situation and the way things can change from one day to the next.
“We’re really focused on this and it’s hard to focus on anything else,” Babin said.