Covid-19 Update Visitors Prohibited
5/26/2020
Hi Everyone! We are hope you are all staying healthy! We are happy to report we remain COVID free with both residents and staff. We are continuing all of our staff screenings prior to their shifts and monitoring them throughout their shifts. I’m sure most of you have heard that we are now testing our staff weekly, due to the Executive Order that was issued by Governor Cuomo on May 10th. Most of the last 2.5 weeks have been focused on the logistics of the staff testing, securing a lab, any many many other issues that have come up with the testing. We as a facility fully support testing our staff, doing whatever we can to keep our residents protected. We unfortunately were given very little help from the state since the E.O. and have been working tirelessly trying to figure it all out. Another thing to note is that Morgan Estates is assuming all the tests costs for the staff, which puts us in a very bad position financially if no government funds are freed up to help us with this. Our costs are estimated at about $10,000 per week for our staff testing, on top of the already added costs of PPE, extra staffing etc. This is definitely a challenging time for us.
With that being said, the Executive Order also prohibits visitors to our facility. We know that this is extremely hard on both family/friends and especially our residents. With the weather warming up we unfortunately still can’t allow outside visits (even with social distancing rules) while the E.O. is in place. Please don’t call them outside to visit under any condition. Window visits are still permissible, but the window should be shut, and if its not then you should have a mask on and be at least 6 feet away. We are sorry that this is how it is and we are giving the residents extra TLC in the building. We appreciate your cooperation with the visitor restrictions, this is the ultimate sacrifice to protect our residents. We are sending all of you love and air hugs as we know this is so very hard on you as well.
One last thing on residents and hospital visits. If a resident is sent to the hospital for any reason, the hospital is required to perform a COVID-19 test on them before they return to the facility. We are taking the utmost precautions to minimize any risk to our residents, so if a resident has had a hospital visit they are required to stay in their room for 14 days on isolation until we can absolutely rule out that they have not been exposed to the virus.
We thank you for your support and feel all of the love. We are here to answer any questions you have. Hang in there!
~Jennifer and Morgan Estates Team
