Elderly care restriction excludes assisted living

The state is focusing its fight against the coronavirus on places that care for and house the elderly, but not every facility falls under strict new rules announced this week.

While nursing home patients with COVID-19 are being separated from those who test negative for the virus, residents at the state’s hundreds of assisted living facilities are exempt from that disruptive yet potentially lifesaving process.

That includes Benchmark Senior

Living at Ridgefield Crossings, an assisted living facility that has already seen nine coronavirus-related deaths among its residents.

The difference centers around licensing, state control and the landlord/tenant relationship at assisted living facilities.

The hospital-like admission process at a nursing home, where patients require physician certification to be admitted, comes with stricter state regulatory oversight and control, said Mairead Painter, the state’s long-term care ombudsman.

An assisted living facility, on the other hand, is essentially a private apartment building that provides in-house nursing and other services residents may need, Painter said.

Those services are provided by a state licensed entity, while the apartment side of the facility is not licensed by the state, she noted.

“It’s a different agreement,” Painter said of assisted care facilities.

Av Harris, a Department of Public Health spokesman, confirmed the order released Monday to create “positive” and “negative” nursing homes is only directed at nursing homes.

“Currently, the relocation is for nursing home residents but can be subject to change based on the situation,” said Harris.

Asked how many of the state’s nursing home patients are infected with COVID-19, Painter said “there are many.”

After announcing the nursing home restrictions earlier this week, Gov. Ned Lamont said the facilities “can be a petri dish in terms of transmission of the virus.”

Nursing homes provide similar services as hospitals. These facilities are capable of providing non-surgical ambulatory services and patients receive varying levels of skilled medical care, depending on their needs.

An assisted living center only offers basic nursing services while focusing on helping residents live as independently as possible. Residents sign leases with the building owner, as would any apartment dweller. Only the services provided to the residents are licensed by the state, not the facility itself.