ASHLAND — In early April, an Ashland nursing home learned an employee tested positive for COVID-19, but the response appears to have kept this case of the novel coronavirus from further spreading within the facility.
Through its COVID-19 Dashboard earlier this week, the State of Ohio’s Health Department reported one individual at the Lutheran Social Services (LSS) The Good Shepherd Skilled Nursing and Rehabilitation Campus, 622 Center St. in Ashland, had tested positive for COVID-19.
An employee received and reported positive test results to the long term care facility on April 2, the Good Shepherd’s communication director Jennifer Hamilton confirmed Friday, April 17.
-
All family and non-medical visitation was suspended unless for extreme measures such as: end of life, or when deemed necessary and approved by the administration.
-
All staff was to enter and exit the community via one designated entrance with screening and temperature taken twice before and after every shift and logged.
-
Resident temperatures were taken multiple times every day.
-
Staff members were to wear personal protective equipment.
-
All resident communal dining, activities or therapy were suspended.
-
Staff was required to report off work with any signs and symptoms of COVID-19.
-
All staff was to follow good hand hygiene, cover etiquette, not touching the face and social distancing.
-
Nursing staff had been educated regarding resident signs and symptoms of COVID-19, along with testing protocols.
-
Infection preventionist on staff was to determine if a staff member may work or stay at home.
-
Infection preventionist would work closely with and follow all CDC and ODH and local guidelines regarding resident and staff protocols.
The employee had last reported to work on March 30 and exhibited no symptoms at that time, Hamilton continued.
At that time, the individual — like other employees — was instructed to use a mask, wear other personal protective equipment (PPE) and follow a set of precautionary measures based on Center for Disease Control (CDC) and State of Ohio Health Department’s recommendations.
The measures have since been expanded upon. The nursing home’s staff and residents now are checked for signs and symptoms of COVID-19 and have their temperature taken every four hours instead of every eight hours. Face shields from the locally-organized Open Source COVID-19 Medical Supplies are also now used when interacting with any residents who are under investigation for the virus.
As of Friday afternoon, 15 employees and 13 residents from the LLS Good Shepherd Skilled Nursing and Rehabilitation Campus in Ashland had been tested for COVID-19. All have come back negative.
“I think this speaks to the precautions we are taking that it was contained,” Hamilton said. “Also, again those tests weren’t all the result of the employee testing positive.”
The nursing home staff contacted every resident’s family via phone and a letter within 24 hours of the positive case, Hamilton continued. Residents and staff were informed of this, too.
“We want to be very transparent about this. We’re doing everything we can to protect everyone in our building, both residents and staff,” she said.
The employee who tested positive has not yet returned to work.
The Ashland County Health Department’s director of nursing Shirley Bixby commended the facility at a Friday afternoon press conference.
“The facility that that individual was at has amazing policies and procedures in place to keep the spread of COVID-19 down to a very minimal,” Bixby said. “Two days prior to this happening, use of surgical masks was implemented for everyone working in that facility, and we believe that was one factor that really helped keep that from spreading in that facility.”
LLS The Good Shepherd’s facility hosted the CDC, Ohio Department of Health and the local health department Wednesday for a meeting, which addressed best practices and process improvement for containing COVID-19.
“They are touring facilities to give advice on procedures that could be improved upon to help try and prevent, minimize COVID outbreaks. The information from the visit will be shared with our other local facilities to help them prepare as well,” Hamilton said. “They were very complimentary of our facility.”
