A long-term care centre in western Canada has an innovative way to allow residents to visit with family and avoid the risk of catching COVID-19. The Queen’s Park Care Centre in the New Westminster suburb of Vancouver has a renovated shipping container that has a plexiglass partition and separate entrances for residents and families.
From the very start, the pandemic hit long-term care facilities hard in Canada. Infections were rampant, in part transmitted by workers who, in many parts of the country, worked in multiple facilities to make ends meet. And, as science has shown, those over the age of 60 are at high risk of complications and death. So to reduce the risk, many residences barred visitors, severely restricted their numbers or only allowed residents to see their families through outside windows of the facility.
Long-term care home infection rate called ‘a national disgrace’
There have been many stories about how difficult this has been and how many long term care residents have died alone. “In June 2020…Canada’s national health data agency reported that Canada had the worst record among wealthy nations for COVID-19 related deaths in long-term care facilities for older people,” reported the medical journal The Lancet. “Many observers referred to it as a ‘national disgrace.’”
Long-term care homes are not part of the national public health system. Some are privately run for profit and others are operated by provincial, territorial or municipal authorities. Some of the worst outbreaks were said to have occurred in for-profit facilities. In some of them, the situation was so bad that the army was called in to provide help.
The renovated shipping container has two separate entrances for residents and visitors. (Fraser Health)
Staff came up with the container idea
Workers in long-term care facilities are concerned that not being able to visit with family has been extremely difficult for residents. Staff at the Queen’s Park Care centre wanted to find a way to allow visits while keeping residents safe. The centre is an acute and long term care facility with 77 rehabilitation patients and 148 residents. Executive Director of the Queen’s Park Healthcare Foundation, Elizabeth Kelly liked the idea staff members had of setting up a separate place for meetings. She applied for and obtained a $25,000 grant from the federal government to purchase the shipping container. The regional health authority, Fraser Health, provided the ventilation and hook-ups for utilities.
The container was renovated and furnished. The average temperature in New Westminster in January is between 0 and 5 degrees Celsius so heating was installed. Up to four people at a time can visit. They must wear masks and sanitize their hands. They must complete a COVID-19 screening document and have their temperatures checked and they must go in and out of the container only using the visitor entrance. Staff bring the residents in through a separate entrance to the area on the other side of the plexiglass. Reaction has been positive.
Social isolation was ‘taking a toll’
“It’s an innovative way to bring families together,” says Karl Segnoe, whose 92-year-old grandmother lives at Queen’s Park Care Centre. “I have every confidence in the staff to keep my grandmother safe, but I fear social isolation is taking a toll on her well-being. Being able to visit as a family will be huge because my grandmother is such an important person in our lives.”
Visits in the container are allowed by appointment only and window visits continue to be allowed.
“All of us at Queen’s Park Care Centre are looking forward to the day when COVID-19 is behind us and we can remove the partition in the visitor centre so families can celebrate together and hug each other,” said Kelly. “The pandemic has taught us that the small things in life are really the most important.”
The western province of Manitoba has paid $17.9 million for the deliver of up to 90 shipping containers that will be adapted and used in the same way for visits between long-term care residents and family members.
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