A Nottingham care home has successfully managed to contain a Covid outbreak and save lives thanks to the hard work of staff.
The Church Farm at Skylarks home in West Bridgford has experienced 13 cases of coronavirus in recent weeks but every single patient has made a full recovery.
Church Farm Care said disaster was averted due to thanks to the hard work of carers and staff led by head of nursing Maria Spollin.
Spollin worked as an intensive care nurse during the 2009 swine flu outbreak, so she was well-equipped to lead the team following doctors confirming five positive tests.
After the tests, the care team was instructed to treat any resident with symptoms of coronavirus as having contracted the virus.
Family consent was acquired to isolate all those with the virus or showing symptoms.
Spollin said: “This was of course a difficult decision to make as we had to consider that someone showing symptoms may not necessarily have contracted the virus, and if we opted to isolate them we would therefore be exposing them to the virus from those who tested positive.
“But it was absolutely critical that we reacted quickly and incorporated these isolation measures as soon as possible.”
As well as setting up ‘ward beds’, the isolation area also included chairs and activities to make sure residents did not have to remain bed-bound and could still engage with normal activities during the recovery phase.
Church Farm Care director Patrick Atkinson said: “The crucial thing is to react and isolate quickly if you believe someone is symptomatic.”
He added: “Maria was instrumental in our containment process and in preventing further infection within our residents. Using her experience from the swine flu outbreak, she implemented a ‘zoning’ process, turning a communal area into a make-shift ward with beds after residents began showing symptoms.”
Atkinson said Church Farm Care is working to meet the emotional needs of residents across its homes.
“We are doing lots of different things across our four homes to keep everyone’s spirits high – from a socially distanced concert from a relative to opening our own in-house salon,” he added.
