We are sad once again to report that we have had three more COVID resident/patient deaths related to our outbreak at St. Paul Home in Kaukauna between Sunday and today. As we have mentioned previously, we completed advanced care planning related to Covid19 specifically at the start of this pandemic (and upon admission here for any new residents/patients along the way), and we are following each person’s individual choices they made for the care they wanted in the event of being ill with Covid19.
We were notified late last night that five additional residents tested positive from our all-resident testing on Monday, all from our long-term care area within St. Paul Home. They were all immediately transferred into our COVID isolation unit. All other St. Paul Home residents tested negative. We continue to have no positive staff or residents from St. Paul Manor, St. Paul Villa or McCormick Assisted Living. We also continue to have our Adult Day and other outreach programs temporarily closed.
To summarize this outbreak thus far, since so much has changed day by day over the last two weeks:
- 29 total residents/patients of St. Paul Home have been infected
- 4 residents have died, and we sadly do expect at least 1 more death
- 2 residents are currently hospitalized; we anticipate one will return to us soon
- 2 residents have been discharged from our isolation unit and are continuing their recovery in their regular rooms
- 21 residents are currently being cared for in our COVID isolation units; most are experiencing mild to moderate symptoms, and we are hopeful that the majority of them will recover
We were notified today that another associate has tested positive from our all-staff testing on Monday. We have now had 12 associate positives potentially associated with this outbreak, although we also cannot rule out community exposure in any associate case. So far, this is the only new positive staff test result from this week’s all-staff testing, with having the majority of test results back.
We received our Point of Care antigen testing machine and supplies today, so we are working to get that put into service quickly, as it will help us swiftly cohort/isolate residents who are newly positive/infectious, which will be the key to ending this outbreak.
The Division of Quality Assurance completed another Focused Infection Control Survey (inspection) yesterday and late into last evening. We were once again deficiency-free, and the surveyors shared that they saw excellent compliance with hand hygiene, PPE use, screening/surveillance of symptoms, assessment of clinical condition and physician update, and environmental setup and cleanliness. We feel validated with this survey outcome that we have done everything we could/can to prevent and control this outbreak.
Yesterday, we held a 3-hour Zoom meeting for families to log on and ask any questions they may have at this time. The families who joined us had many reasonable and appropriate questions, but we are really grateful that so many who joined also made sure to share their support and confidence in us as well.
We also share with you this statement from the Chair of our Board of Directors, indicating the Board’s full support for the SPES team at this time:
“Vince Lombardi once said: ‘It is time for us all to stand and cheer for the doer, the achiever – the one who recognizes the challenges and does something about it.’ Today we stand and cheer for our great team at St. Paul Elder Services. We honor their passion and sacrifice to care for our aging neighbors and families.”
Andrew Schmidt
Board Chair
St. Paul Elder Services
Please continue to practice and promote 100% pandemic responsibility, as we all need to do our part to help facilities like ours prevent this virus from coming through our doors. None of our protective protocols is 100% fail-safe, so the more this virus makes its way in, the odds of keeping it at bay decline. In our case, our biggest concern has been realized in having an associate unwittingly pick this virus up in the community and transmit it to those in our care while simply trying to protect them.
Thank you for your continued prayer and support. We are here for you, should you have any questions or concerns.