Visitors to Kentucky nursing homes and other care facilities will face strict limits

Jun. 26--Following three months of forced isolation to curb the spread of COVID-19, Kentucky will let visitors return on Monday to assisted living communities, licensed personal care homes and family care homes, and on July 15 to nursing homes and long-term care facilities for the intellectually disabled.

At the same time, residents who mostly have been confined to their rooms since March will be able to resume some group activities and communal dining in their facilities.

But there will be strict restrictions intended to avoid creating more viral outbreaks. Nearly 350 Kentuckians had died in long-term care facilities after testing positive for the coronavirus as of Friday, with some especially hard hit nursing homes losing close to a quarter of their populations.

"This is done with concern," Kentucky Health and Family Services Secretary Eric Friedlander said in an online message posted Thursday. "But at this point, this is done balancing needs of individuals, needs of families, needs of folks in these facilities themselves to start seeing each other again."

Before they welcome back visitors and resume group activities, the facilities that can start Monday must go 14 days without a new COVID-19 infection among residents and employees, and the facilities with a July 15 start date must go 28 days.

Visits must be scheduled and limited to no more than two visitors per resident. They will take place in a newly designated visitation room near the main entrance -- or outdoors, if such a space is available -- so the room can be sanitized between visits. Seating during visits will be socially distanced.

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Visitors entering the facilities must be masked, and they will be screened for possible signs of COVID-19, such as a fever, cough or known exposure to people who have tested positive.

"We are excited," said Elizabeth Gettings, administrator of the Hearthstone Place nursing home in Todd County. "We're a little apprehensive at the same time, because we want to be careful."

Residents and their loved ones kept in touch over the months through computer screens and by bringing their telephones to Hearthstone Place's large lobby window so they could see each other while chatting, but it wasn't the same as a personal visit, Gettings said.

"The families have been very, very good about it, though," she said. "They know the precautions are done for the safety of the residents."

Peggy Morrison, a 93-year-old retired teacher in Pulaski County, has four friends at The Neighborhood of Somerset, an assisted living facility. Morrison regularly visited her friends before the pandemic hit and said Friday that she will be glad to see them again, although she will wait to give their families a chance to go first.

She also wants to be certain there are adequate safeguards in place to protect visitors as well as residents and staff, she said.

"I don't want to catch something and spread it," Morrison said.

A Kentucky nursing home reform advocate said she worries about what's been happening behind closed doors for three months.

"We need to get some outside eyes in there to see what's going on," said Wanda Delaplane, a former Kentucky assistant attorney general who lobbies in Frankfort for stronger nursing home regulations.

"Some of these residents have been in total isolation, with nobody outside of the facility to talk to," Delaplane said. "I have serious questions about of the practices that have gone on in some of our nursing homes over the years in terms of quality of care and hygiene problems. I don't think all of these problems suddenly stopped happening when the doors closed in March."

The state's publicly funded ombudsmen, who visit nursing homes and talk to residents about their concerns, will get to return along with other visitors, said Sherry Culp, the Kentucky State Long Term Care Ombudsman.

There are likely to be complaints that need attention, Culp said.

"This means we can resume our intimate, close-up relationships with residents," Culp said. "Even with social distancing, we'll try to make sure we have some auditory privacy so that people can talk to us confidentially if there are things they don't want staff to overhear."

"I think we're going to hear a lot about the emotional effects on people who have been living alone in these facilities for three months with a pandemic going on around them," Culp said. "That's going to be severe."

Reporter Bill Estep contributed to this story.

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