Louisiana resident Debbie Dodson had planned to drive to Columbus for her mother, Margaret Joyner’s, 85th birthday on April 1.

The last time the two women saw each other was December, shortly after Joyner moved into Garden Hill Assisted Living and Personal Care on Yorkville Road. But on March 12, Garden Hill Administrator Brandee Delaney texted family members of all the residents telling them the assisted living center was now closed to all visitors except certain medical workers.

“I had made plans to … go out to eat and shop and things like that,” Dodson said. “I’ll miss not being there with her for her birthday and just seeing her. We talk every day, but it makes a difference if you can just see each other.”

Garden Hill is not alone. Nursing homes and assisted living centers have been closing to the public in recent weeks as the COVID-19 novel coronavirus spreads throughout the country.

“You’re seeing how fast things are spreading within the last three days. Mississippi was at 12; they’re at 50 now,” Delaney said on Thursday. (The number has since increased to 140.) “That rapid increase, it can be frightening.”

Particularly susceptible to the virus are members of the elderly population with underlying health conditions — exactly the type of people who live in nursing homes and assisted living communities.

One woman had to wave to her father from six feet away in Garden Hill’s lobby when she saw him while dropping something off. At Trinity Place Retirement Community in southeast Columbus, family members of residents have held up handmade signs to their loved ones through the facility’s windows.

Residents could not congregate in large groups for planned St. Patrick’s Day parties, and even routine Bingo games are prevented. Residents must stay in small groups of three and four when they go on walks outside or sit in one of the facility’s common areas — never for very long.

One of Trinity’s residents, Shirley Arinder, joked that her daily company is the person she sees in the mirror.

“I went in the bathroom and said, ‘You again!'” she said Thursday during a walk outside with a handful of other residents and staff.

“We have to laugh, don’t we?” she added.

Though the new restrictions are difficult, Delaney said most family members are grateful for them. That was certainly the case for Dodson and Steve Wilkes, who has both parents living at Garden Hill.

“Both of my parents are 89,” Wilkes said. “They’re in the high risk category, so anything the assisted living can do to protect them, we were all for it.”

Brainstorming ideas

The sudden inability of nursing home residents to congregate, either with visitors or each other, has left staff members — already spraying down mail, deliveries and surfaces within the homes with Lysol and constantly washing their own hands — scrambling to come up with new, creative ways to keep their clients occupied.

Staff at both Trinity and Garden Hill have passed out goody bags full of things like candy, snacks, puzzles and adult coloring books so residents have things to do while in their rooms.

“I’m doing daily trivia,” said Nikki Austin, Trinity’s activities director for independent care, whose patients require the least personal assistance of the residents at Trinity. “If they give it back to me the next day during our mail route, they’ll get a prize.

“Next week, I have some volunteers that are going to come around to their patio doors and use expo markers and pay tic-tac-toe with them,” she added. “Kids, especially. There’s no contact, and it’ll give them something to do, especially sitting in their rooms.”

For patients in nursing home settings, with limited mobility or conditions like dementia or Alzheimer’s, it can be even harder to stay occupied.

“My people aren’t able to do a lot of trivia or remember stuff,” said Shasty Jethrow, activities director for Trinity Health Care for nursing home patients. “It’s basically just knowing your residents.”

She and her staff have been doing one-on-one activities with them, from jewelry-making and other crafts to writing cards and taking pictures to mail to the residents’ families. Last week, they held a worship service during which a nurse played piano in the common area and staff rolled one resident from room to room to do individual devotionals with the other residents.

Nurses and other staff members are also having to help residents use programs like Skype and FaceTime for the first time so they can see family.

It’s “all hands on deck” to keep those residents engaged at Starkville’s Claiborne at Adelaide, said Scott Hames, senior vice president of operations at Blake Management Group Senior Living, which manages Claiborne and multiple other assisted living centers throughout the country. Directors at each center are pulling extra staff from administrative or other departments to do things as simple as take the less independent residents on a walk or just visit with them.

“Unlike our assisted living residents, who can pick up the phone or watch TV or take a walk on their own … they need that constant redirection, that constant engagement of saying, ‘Hey Mrs. Jones, let’s go do this. Let’s go outside, maybe spend five, 10 minutes and get some fresh air,'” he said.

At a separate Blake facility in Fort Mill, South Carolina, parents with children out of school offered to have their children draw pictures and write messages on the facility’s sidewalks in chalk to brighten the residents’ day — which Hames thought was such a good idea, he sent pictures to Claiborne and other facilities to promote it.

“Basically it’s trying to keep those residents engaged while at the same time understanding that social distancing is part of that,” Hames said.

Still, residents “miss the hugs and handshakes”, and staff have a hard time constantly trying to come up with new activities that follow the rules of social distancing, Austin said.

“My brain is very tired of thinking outside the box,” she said.

Uncertainty

The worst part of the retirement and nursing homes’ new normal is not knowing when it will end, said Jethrow, Austin and Trinity Personal Care activities director Shaquala Joseph.

“A lot of them are asking, ‘How long?'” Joseph said. “And we don’t know.”

She and Austin pointed to visitors coming to talk to residents through windows or leaving signs on the lawn.

“I think more people will want to do that, but then again, are they going to be scared to come out in a couple of weeks when this might get worse?” Austin said. “… Then you’re really going to have to focus and be like, ‘How can I make this be a little more cheerful?’ … I don’t know if it’s going to get any worse or any better. You just have to think about that kind of stuff with the work that we do.”

But the situation has also brought out the best in staff and residents.

“It’s just brought us all closer together,” Garden Hills Activities Director Stacy McGraw said. “… It’s actually been a really pleasant experience for them, because I know they’re unsure about the outside world, what’s going on.”

The same goes for people in the community who have donated items or supported residents other ways, Joseph said.

“We’re just thankful,” she said. “Grateful.”

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