Our community has made great strides in the past year recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic. We are committed to staying several steps ahead of the pandemic and continue to emphasize the measures that enabled us to reach this point: vaccinations, social distancing, mask-wearing, and surface and personal cleanliness.
Regarding vaccines, please refer to the Department of Health (DOH) for eligibility, locations and scheduling information.
We are updating policies and procedures to reflect Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and DOH guidance and you may resume visiting your loved ones more frequently as we continue to advance our policies. Our county continues to be in the yellow zone with a 5.8% positivity rate, so we need to be cautious in our advancement. This week we have increased the time length and number of visits slots for our 1st floor neutral area locations. We are also going to open scheduling on the slots rather than scheduling to specific day based on a resident’s unit. Please see the attached visitation summary.
Visitors are asked to comply with our infection control protocols to maintain their safety and the safety of their loved ones and staff
- Screening
- Eye protection in resident care areas
- Masking is required
- Social distancing
- Hand Hygiene
- Visits are limited to a loved one in the designated area
For more information please refer to these links:
- Nursing Home Visitation – COVID-19
- Fact sheet
- A CMS guides for visitations and core principles of infection prevention are linked from our website’s COVID-19 page.
As we are advancing our visitation protocols, we would like to invite you to join us in a Zoom call next Thursday April 1, 2021, at 2:30 p.m. For those of you who are receiving this letter via email, we will send you a separate invite link via email on Tuesday March 30, 2021, to provide you with the link to join the Zoom meeting on Thursday. Please watch for this email invitation If you are receiving this letter via regular mail since you don’t have an email address and want to participate the group Zoom on visitation protocol changes via a telephone call, please reach out to Brittany Elko at 570-344-6177 ext. 1154 or myself at extension 1101 to obtain information on how to call in to join us by phone for that meeting.
To schedule a visit please contact Lee Rutkowski Monday through Friday by email at lrutkowski@jhep.org or call her 570-344-6177 ext. 1175. Starting on April 5, 2021, Mary Ryan in our business office will be taking over visiting scheduling. She will be working with Lee this coming week training so you may be hearing from her on return calls. Mary can be reached Mon- Friday by email at mryan@jhep.org or by phone at 570-344-6177 ext 1104.
We will continue routine testing for staff weekly on Mondays as our county remains yellow and, in the event of any new positive results, modified visitation restrictions will be implemented and there will be immediate notifications of changes to visitation schedules.
Our staff testing completed this past week returned all negative results. All of our zones remain green except for our designated 4th floor yellow zone for returning and newly admitted residents.
Our Facility’s Resident Impact (Since March 30, 2020, through March 25, 2021)
0 – Residents currently in our building with a confirmed active case of COVID 19
56 – CONFIRMED: Residents with laboratory positive COVID-19
0 – SUSPECTED: Residents with new suspected COVID-19
52 – Confirmed Staff Total: with a positive COVID-19
- Please note that test results are reported on our daily call-in line at 570-207-6711. Family members and all others impacted by the virus will be contacted directly and provided with results and updates.
Thank you again for entrusting with the care of your loved ones. If you have any questions, we are always available for you.
Sincerely,
Mary Rose Applegate, MBA, RD, NHA
Administrator
