COVER STORY
Spring Village at Pocono & Woodbridge Place
PAWS to Consider What’s Important Spring Village at Pocono and Woodbridge Place pride themselves on providing a home-like setting in their communities. One major factor in ensuring that residents feel at home is promoting a pet-friendly environment. Both communities have pets, and they always welcome them. In addition to community pets, residents are encouraged to bring their personal pets when they move. At Woodbridge Place, everyone’s favorite resident is Snowflake, aka “Snowy.” Snowy is a rescue dog that lives at the community and provides emotional support for the residents. While she lives with one resident, she is everyone’s favorite dog. Throughout the day, Snowy roams the hallways looking for a friend—and maybe a treat. Even throughout the pandemic, Snowy has kept up daily rounds, visiting with residents in their rooms. “Snowy is an integral part of our team. There is no question about that,” said Senior Executive Director of Woodbridge Place Deb Bodnar. “There is just something so grounding about a fur baby, who simply wants to visit with you and be petted. Our residents gain so much from Snowy.”
Continued from page 15 Pocono resident Evelyn Marx. “Nobody can come in here, and they keep everything immaculately clean. I haven’t had to worry about anything because it is all taken care of for me.” Evelyn has enjoyed outdoor visits with her daughter and waves at her grandchild through the window. She keeps herself busy doing puzzles and participating in community-organized games.
Connecting and Comforting
“We are not alone.” That message, complete with a rainbow, adorns every window at Woodbridge Place, a personal care and memory care community located in Phoenixville, PA. While they may be required to distance for their safety, Woodbridge Place residents know they are never truly alone thanks to the monumental efforts of the community’s staff. Like their sister property, Woodbridge Place acted early and tested aggressively to keep residents
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“We were able to connect with a private lab to get every staff member and resident tested for COVID-19. I found out exactly what was happening in our building and used that knowledge to keep our residents safe.” —Chris Behm, senior executive director of Spring Village at Pocono
safe. Senior Executive Director Deb Bodnar also participated in the corporate conference calls and used the many resources that were offered. “The conference calls provided so many interesting perspectives, and we were able to problem solve together,” said Deb. “We shared best practices, but we also shared camaraderie. It was such a difficult and uncertain time in the beginning of the pandemic and that connection meant so much.” Woodbridge Place began taking extra precautions to protect their residents and suspended visitors in early March.
When local schools closed, the staff advised residents to stay in their rooms and wear a mask whenever they interacted with others. The community initiated comprehensive testing in April. “We knew this was very contagious, so we were looking for symptoms early on, but as we learned that it could be spread by asymptomatic people, we realized we had to do wide-scale testing,” Deb explained. Rather than wait for government action, Woodbridge Place also contracted with a private company to test their residents and staff. They found 800-394-9990 | retirementlivingsourcebook.com
