Three Manor of the Plains employees test positive for COVID-19
Three Manor of the Plains employees have tested positive for COVID-19 in the campus’ surveillance testing this week.
The campus tested 69 employees on Monday, October 26. Three employee tests were returned positive, and 66 results were negative.
The first employee, who is an essential health care worker, tested positive on a rapid point-of-care test at the campus last weekend. The employee had been out on quarantine and was testing to return to work after a close contact had tested positive for COVID-19. Per Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Guidelines, rapid tests should be confirmed with a standard test. When the positive result was received, the employee was instructed to participate in Monday’s surveillance testing to confirm the results.
The second employee is a non-direct resident care employee who last worked October 25. The employee passed the pre-shift screening and wore personal protective equipment as required. Contact tracing did not reveal any employees or residents who met the definition of close contact.
The third employee is an essential health care worker who last worked Thursday, October 29. The employee passed the pre-shift screening and wore PPE as required. The employee was notified of the positive result immediately and sent home to quarantine.
The Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE) epidemiology hotline and Ford County Health Department were notified immediately. They recommend continuing with the preventive measures we have in place. We will continue to monitor residents for signs and symptoms and continue employee surveillance testing as scheduled November 2 and 4. In addition, they recommended suspending communal dining and group activities and continuing to limit visitation to outdoor visits, weather permitting.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has mandated surveillance testing of our staff. Surveillance testing requires all employees, agency employees, volunteers, hospice, lab and therapy providers at our campus to be tested on a frequency determined by our county’s COVID-19 testing positivity rate. Based on our county positivity rate for COVID-19 tests, our campus is testing staff twice a week.
Employees are encouraged to follow CDC guidelines and best practices as these are continually updated. The community regularly reinforces with all employees that an employee should not report to work if he or she is experiencing symptoms of a respiratory illness or is not feeling well.
The employees are recuperating at home. We follow CDC and KDHE guidelines in determining when an employee may return to work. Under the current guidelines, the employee may return to work when at least 72 hours have passed since resolution of the employee’s fever without the use of fever-reducing medications and the employee’s symptoms have improved, and at least 10 days have passed since symptoms first appeared. Asymptomatic positive employees will quarantine for 14 days. Upon the employee’s return to work, we will follow CDC recommendations related to work practices and restrictions.
For more information about Manor of the Plains’ response, go to PMMA’s (Presbyterian Manors of Mid-America’s) website, presbyterianmanors.org/media-room.
