The Lakeside Manor community is mourning the death of a resident who was recently hospitalized for another health issue but was found to have had COVID-19.
Melanie Reinhardt, president at Lakeside Manor, confirmed a resident had passed away but, out of respect for the family and privacy, was unable to comment further.
“We are aware that one of our residents has passed away during this time, but I want to be really respectful of the family,” said Reinhardt.
As of Dec. 11, there were five confirmed cases at Lakeside Manor, a retirement residential complex run by Vantage Living. On Thursday, Dec. 24, Reinhardt said that since the 11th, more cases of COVID-19 had been confirmed and that affected residents remained in self-quarantine.
“I tend to stay away from the numbers because they tend to be a little bit interpretive, because there’s the number of people who have been diagnosed and numbers of people who have been cleared,” said Reinhardt, who stressed there have been no new cases since Dec. 16.
Read more: Five cases of COVID-19 now confirmed at Salmon Arm independent living complex
Read more: UPDATE: Three cases of COVID-19 confirmed at Salmon Arm retirement living facility
Back on the 11th, Reinhardt was hoping conditions might have improved enough to look at slowly reopening some of Lakeside’s communal facilities. Now, that won’t be a consideration until at least Dec. 30.
“We’re not opening anything until we’re 14 days clear,” said Reinhardt. “I’m trying not to give our residents any false hope on dates. I’m working with our medical health officers on the reopening plan.”
Asked about protocol related to deliveries, Reinhardt noted one change has to do with pharmacy deliveries.
“We have increased our individual activity in deliveries,” said Reinhardt. “For example, pharmacies. Pharmacies used to deliver to the residents’ doors, and now they deliver to our front office and we arrange with the individuals to get their pharmacy orders delivered.”
Staff at Lakeside continue to conduct wellness checks with residents to make sure their needs are being addressed.
“We have people who are telling us I’m choosing just to stay in my room right now,” said Reinhardt. “We want to support that. These are our friends, these are our community members. So I’m making sure my team is reaching out to them by telephone a couple of times a week just to make sure that if they need anything, that somebody knows and somebody can respond to it.”
With no new cases of COVID-19 arising over the past eight days, Reinhardt is looking forward to the end of the month, hoping to have turned a corner.
“Again, it’s important everybody knows, we’re not moving ahead without medical health officers,” said Reinhardt. “We’re moving in-step, making sure that everybody is comfortable with our plans to keep the community safe.”
