COVID-19 clusters identified at Windsor Regional, Hotel-dieu Grace

A cluster of COVID-19 cases has been identified at each of Windsor's two hospitals, prompting investigations Friday to discover the source of transmission and potential risk to staff and patients.

Neither Windsor Regional Hospital nor Hotel-dieu Grace Healthcare were revealing exactly how many of their people — staff or patients — were confirmed COVID-19 cases, although HDGH said it has “less than 20 confirmed and/or under investigation cases of COVID-19 in the HDGH cluster.”

It added that it is taking this “very seriously.”

At Windsor Regional, the cluster is on the seventh floor of its Ouellette campus, where special precautions are being taken. Any patient admissions to the floor are being closely examined and patients already there can't be transferred out unless they're discharged home or need to go somewhere out of medical necessity, such as to the intensive care unit.

All patients on the seventh floor were to be tested for COVID-19 by the end of the day Friday. Staff who had any contact with the floor between Nov. 18 and Friday have been notified and asked to get swabbed for the virus.

Visits to the floor are not allowed until further notice.

“Both hospitals continue to work with the Windsor-essex County Health Unit to investigate the circumstances of the cluster and we will provide an update when more details become available,” the Windsor Regional release says.

HDGH says the patients in its affected unit are all being tested and staff who worked in the unit are being offered testing. In addition, the hospital is closing the unit to new admissions, enhancing cleaning, reinforcing the importance of PPE use and consistent hand-washing, and suspending a visitation program in the unit that allows designated family members to help with care.

Dr. Wajid Ahmed, medical officer of health for the Windsor-essex County Health Unit, said the health unit is working closely with hospital officials to investigate the clusters. Due to privacy concerns, he said, the health unit is “unable to disclose publicly any further details about the cases or the number of close contacts at the hospitals.”