Throughout Lutheran Senior Services (LSS) communities, staff in Assisted Living are keeping residents engaged with life enrichment activities. LSS team members also are focused on finding opportunities to spend quality time with Assisted Living residents. Staff members check in on residents regularly, and with visits limited due to COVID-19 guidelines caregivers are going the extra mile to engage residents.
Laura Bates, an LSS Certified Nursing Assistant (CNA), assists residents with activities of daily living and keeps a close eye on their mental and physical health. She works closely with the rest of the care team to make sure residents are getting the care they need. In addition to her usual rounds, Bates makes sure she spends extra time with each resident.
“We love them like family,” said Bates of the residents she works with in Assisted Living. “We talk about our lives and share stories. We share smiles by joking around together and spend as much time as we can with them.”
Lifestyle enrichment staff regularly share packets with word searches and puzzles to keep residents’ minds active. Staff also schedule video calls so residents and their family members can visit using Skype. LSS is closely following the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) visitation guidelines during COVID-19. The ability to have indoor visits depends upon positivity rates in the community’s surrounding county and active cases within the community. As county positivity rates lower, more communities are looking forward to having indoor visits soon.
“We have a library here and I’ve noticed more residents checking out books to read, too,” added Bates. “We’re also watching movies and sports together. We have residents who are big Cardinals fans, so we watch a lot of baseball together in summer and fall.”
Bates wants to assure family members that their loved ones are being well cared for and that staff are keeping them as active and engaged as possible.
“Families have been really understanding and we appreciate that,” added Bates.