Dear Residents and Families of Golden Life Villages,
As the weather improves Golden Life is working to create safe environments for our residents to get outside. Providing safe spaces to walk around the Village while protecting residents and staff from potential exposure to COVID-19 is our main goal.
To date, we have deployed every best practice available to keep COVID-19 from our Villages. Along with our Health Authority partners, we have identified three critical sources of potential risk for COVID-19: staff entering our site, deliveries of care packages and supplies, and families and/or residents not adhering to policies.
To mitigate the risks from staff we have comprehensive and vigilant screening and strict personal protective equipment protocols in place. Risks from deliveries have been diminished by reducing deliveries with alternate meal packages and in-house ordering as well as a reduced schedule for essentials which enables staff to thoroughly sanitize everything entering our buildings. Risk from families and residents have been mitigated through the essential visitors’ only policy and our self-isolation protocols for those residents who must leave the Village for a critical appointment. As a reminder the Provincial Health Officer has defined an essential visitor as only one family member whose loved one is critically ill. In both these measures we continue to urge residents and families to adhere to our policies and protections.
We know it is difficult to be away from loved ones. To help keep families connected we have provided tablets for virtual visits and opportunities to meet from windows and balconies. In addition, we have designated safe visiting areas outside of each Independent Living Village which adhere to social distancing protocols. If you wish to use these spaces please contact your local Village. Of course, we realize with the nice weather families may want to join their loved one for a walk but unfortunately our site staff cannot guarantee social distancing protections during this activity. To protect our residents and staff, residents found to be visiting or walking with family outside of a designated safe zone will need to self-isolate in their suite for 14 days.
We recognize how difficult this is for everyone but it is imperative that we continue to work together for everyone’s health and well-being.
Thank you for your understanding and support as we navigate through this challenging time. If you have any questions about this, or any of our other initiatives, please email, covid19@glm.ca, or call our toll free number, (866) 466-0852, where staff are available to address any questions.
Sincerely,
Celeste Mullin
Vice President