Senior living communities get creative with activities
Peering from their windows earlier this year, residents of Manatawny Manor saw a strange visitor staring back at them.
The big eyes beneath the long lashes in the furry face outside belonged to Duchess, an alpaca.
The woolly camelid, owned by Wendy Tucci of Dream Maker Alpaca Ranch in Union Township, Berks County, brightened the day for residents confined to their rooms due to precautions taken to help prevent the spread of the coronavirus.
“We have to be creative with all the things we offer,” Joenel Torrillo, executive director of the senior-living community, said of the facility’s effort to provide engaging activities while keeping residents safe.
Manatawny in East Coventry Township, Chester County, is one of nine Diakon continuing-care retirement communities in Pennsylvania and Maryland.
The Lutheran social service also operates The Lutheran Home at Topton in Berks County.
With statewide COVID-19 mitigation measures restricting social activities in senior living communities, Diakon and other independent- and assisted-living facilities and nursing homes are finding new ways to keep residents active and entertained.
“They’ve been doing a fantastic job,” William Swanger, Diakon’s senior vice president for corporate communications and public relations, said of Manatawny.
Swanger noted that as of mid-May the facility near Pottstown had no recorded cases of the coronavirus among its residents and staff.
Torrillo said Manatawny’s staff has come up with numerous fun and entertaining activities since restrictions on communal dining and recreation were adopted in March.
Among the more imaginative was a recent Flores de Mayo, or Flowers of May, festival.
Flores de Mayo is celebrated throughout the month in the Philippines, where it originated to honor the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Staff at Manatawny put their own spin on the tradition for Mother’s Day. They dressed in bright floral prints and paraded down the facility’s hallways, holding umbrellas decorated with colorful flowers over the heads of residents, who stayed safely in their rooms.
Torrillo’s staff is one of many taxed with keeping the residents of senior living facilities from getting bored during the social-distancing phase of the pandemic.
The restrictions have not been easy for the usually active residents of The Heritage of Green Hills in Cumru Township, Berks.
“They feel like they are caged lions,” said Cheryl Anderson, Well By Design program director at The Heritage. “They are used to doing all kinds of stuff, and now they can’t.”
Residents are being asked not to leave the senior community’s 80-acre campus but are free roam the premises in small groups of four or five and while using recommended social-distancing techniques.
“I want them outside in the sun and fresh air,” she said
Anderson has come up with several ways to encourage fun outdoor activities, including a “bear hunt.”
Residents were encouraged to place stuffed bears in their windows where they could be spotted by those walking outdoors.
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