As lockdown restrictions ease across the country, and after close consultation among our staff, we are excited to announce our own changes in visiting guidelines. These include in-room visits, longer and more frequent in-home visits, an increase in visitors per resident, and out of home visits to café/bars. In line with this week’s news that hugging is now permitted in the community, we are delighted to also announce that residents and visitors can hug again. The following guidelines will come into place from Thursday, May 20, 2021.
- Visitors can request that visits take place in residents’ rooms, with the agreement of the resident;
- Hugging will be permitted and gowns will no longer be necessary (face masks are still required);
- In-home visits can last for up to an hour and visitors will be able to see their loved one up to twice a week;
- Up to two designated visitors can visit per resident;
- Residents can meet up to six people from six households, in keeping with the Scottish Government’s general regulations covering outdoor socialising. Please note the resident accounts for one household;
- Out-of-home visits – which are not restricted in duration – can take place up to twice a week;
- Out-of-home visits can include café/bars indoors with residents and their visitors following the required infection prevention and control guidelines as set by public health and the venue being visited;
Please note that the people visiting or picking up the resident for an outdoor visit should be designated visitors and will be required to test negative in an on-the-spot COVID-19 test. Staff at the home will guide visitors through our checklist of infection prevention and control guidelines, including good handwashing and hand sanitising.
In-home visits will continue to be booked online. Out-of-home visits should be arranged directly with the care home. We ask that you help our care home teams out by giving sufficient notice for an out-of-home visit.
Our outdoor visiting guidelines remain unchanged, with residents able to meet up to six people from six households outside, and garden and window visits of up to two people per resident. (Please note the resident accounts for one household.)
We are very excited to be making these changes to our visiting policy however, we understand that with change can come some anxiety too. If you are in any way worried or concerned about visiting your loved one while COVID is still very much a concern, please don’t hesitate to talk this through with your Home Manager. Further information and tips are available on the Relatives’ section of our website: https://balhousiecare.co.uk/coronavirus-faqs/
Click here for the Scottish Government’s latest Open With Care guidelines.
UPDATE, May 24 2021: Please note an update on our guidelines surrounding face mask and visor wearing. Visitors are required to wear a facemask whist in the home unless medically exempt. If exempt then a face visor will be offered as an alternative. A full update on our visiting protocol can be found here.
