Hospital scales back visitor policy to Phase 1

By Mark Ribble

LEAMINGTON — Erie Shores Health- Care has scaled back their visitor policy, just a week after announcing they were relaxing the visitation rules at the hospital.

Due to a significant rise in COVID cases at the Assessment Centre and in the Emergency Department, the hospital has had to tighten things back up.

According to Dr. Ross Moncur, Chief of Staff and interim CEO for ESHC, there is definite potential for an outbreak locally.

“These are early indications of a potential outbreak of COVID in our community,” he said. “Our goal in this situation is to monitor the data carefully and to stay ahead of any potential spikes."

Erie Shores HealthCare’s COVID unit, which has been as high as 50 per cent full, is now at capacity.

"We treat people with symptoms as COVID positive until we get their test results back, so there may be some overlap there,” he said.

While Dr. Moncur stopped short of saying the community should be alarmed, he agreed it is concerning. “We should be a bit wary,” he said. He agreed that he is as tired of the restrictions as everyone else, but we need to keep up the fight against the virus.

“As restrictions are lifted, we need to be diligent,” he said.

DR. ROSS MONCUR

Over the past weekend, the hospital has reverted back to Phase 1 of their visitor policy, re-implementing active staff screening, including temperatures, at all entrances, reinforcing the use of masks at all times in the building, transitioning all meetings back to virtual meetings and they are requiring non-essential staff to work from home.

Phase 1 Visitation allows visitation only in the following settings: For an inpatient who is actively dying, as defined by the Most Responsible Physician (MRP), may have no more than two family members present at a time and within reason. This includes patients receiving Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD).

If the patient who is dying has COVID-19, they may have one family member with them. This may have to be someone who is not a member of the same household as the patient in order to be able to pass the screening, which currently restricts access to persons in close contact with known or suspected persons with COVID-19. Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) will be provided by the clinical unit for this family member to keep them safe while they are with their loved one. Note: this direction may change at any time based on COVID-19 prevalence within the community or hospital.

A small number of patients (e.g. very frail/elderly, patient with dementia, person who is non-verbal or severely disabled) require a family member to be present because ESHC cannot provide safe care otherwise. In this case, and at the direction of the clinical provider/ team, a family member may be required to accompany a patient.

A patient who is at imminent risk of dying may have a loved one present with them during their Emergency Department (ED) stay. Patients with cognitive or mobility difficulties may be accompanied by one person during their ED stay. Paediatric patients in the Emergency Department are permitted to be accompanied by one adult family member.

Women in active labour may be accompanied by one adult family member. This includes the duration of their post-partum stay.

Paediatric patients (Inpatients, Emergency Department and Perioperative Services) may have up to one adult family member present. Please note: the hospital remains at an overall Pandemic Response Stage 1B. The above change does not affect the booking of procedures or surgeries.

Dr. Moncur stressed that these measures are necessary to avoid a large spike in the community and that their goal is to get back to loosening the restrictions as soon as they can do so safely.

“It’s the last thing we wanted to do,” he added.