Though nursing homes and other long-term care facilities have been hit hard by the new coronavirus, Maryland Baptist Aged Home in Baltimore has not reported a single case of COVID-19 during the pandemic, PBS News Hour reports.
The nursing home's director, the Rev. Derrick DeWitt, told PBS how staff managed to keep the virus out of the 100-year-old facility. Here are five things to know from the discussion:
1. The nursing home was proactive and started taking action early, when the U.S. was reporting only 15 cases or so.
2. The nursing home locked down and stopped allowing visitors at the " very end of February, 1st of March," the director said.
3. The facility instituted a rigorous screening process for employees coming to work, asking them details of their time outside work and taking their body temperatures.
4. The nursing home had a full-time infection control nurse who had helped set up protocols to be used in case of an epidemic or pandemic.
5. The facility took the emotional health of its residents seriously and took steps to make the lockdown easier on them, including bringing in extra activity staff to make sure that residents had visits every day.
Read the full discussion here.