[ad_1]
After a coronavirus outbreak, an elderly housing complex in Berlin’s Lichtenberg district was cleared overnight. 70 forces from the Berlin fire brigade and the German Red Cross moved into the house in the Fennpfuhl district on Monday night to take the remaining 73 residents to nine different clinics.
Eight seniors have been hospitalized since the beginning of last week. Coronaviruses were detected in 22 patients, six of whom have Covid-19. One patient is currently in intensive care and one has already passed away. This comes from a list now available from the Department of Health; in the morning there were initially 28 infected and 18 sick people. The Senate Health Administration now wants to inspect other operator facilities and have all personnel evaluated.
The Rudolf-Seiffert-Strasse senior housing complex is part of a network of seven facilities, six of which are in Lichtenberg and one in Pankow. These are not inpatient nursing homes, but homes where the elderly live in individual apartments, mostly for seniors, and where they are cared for by an outpatient nursing service or caring relatives if they require care. Home health care HKP Chickowsky GmbH took care of the outpatient care of the 320 residents of the seven residential complexes.
According to the operator, the house in Fennpfuhl contains “generously designed one and two-bedroom apartments of approximately 35 to a maximum of 80 square meters”. All apartments are equipped with a small kitchen and bathroom for the disabled. “The heart of the house is the large common room with community kitchen for social gatherings.” The youngest resident is 50, the oldest 101.
The starting point of the now evacuation was a case of illness last week, said Daniel Heide, co-director of Chickowsky GmbH, the Tagesspiegel. The health of an 84-year-old resident of the now evacuated residential complex deteriorated on April 20, and he was transferred to a nearby hospital. Pneumonia was found there, and therefore a Covid-19 test was performed. The positive test result was available two days later. The 81 residents of the facility were screened for the virus. With a total of 22, the result was positive. The deceased is the first patient on Monday of last week.
Nursing Service: “There are people impossible to teach who keep coming home”
Police are now investigating how the virus could enter the housing complex, Heide said. The nursing staff had followed protective measures. “For example, he was instructed to wear mouth and nose protection when it was not required.”
Many inpatient nursing homes It has long since issued an almost complete ban on visits. However, such restrictions are much more difficult to implement in senior housing, Heide explained. That is why they are not covered by the provisions of the Senate Containment Ordinance.
“Of course, the recommendation that we do not currently visit residents also applies to the facilities we manage,” Heide emphasized. “Most family members understand and accept that. But there are also people who cannot be taught who keep coming home.” There are also residents who are cared for directly by family members or where they regularly help with the home, do laundry.
Disinfectants purchased in nail salons at the Don Xuan Center
Heide’s partner Andreas Chickowsky suspects the outbreak is due to the fact that not all residents followed the recommendation to stay at the facility. “Many have followed the measures, others have not,” he told the German Press Agency. Some lacked insight. Chickowsky hopes that patients can only return in 10 to 14 days. He also expects the rooms on the premises to be completely disinfected.
There was no shortage of protective material, Chickowsky said. However, it was partly organized on adventurous paths. For example, a colleague bought disinfectants in closed nail studios at the Don Xuan Center in Lichtenberg. Masks had been distributed to residents of the facility.
A third of residents suffer from dementia.
About a third of residents are patients with dementia, for whom quarantine measures cannot be easily implemented, co-director Heide said. “We cannot legally prevent these residents from leaving their homes.” To lock them up against their will requires a corresponding decision by the district court. Fortunately, we work well with the district court, and such a decision is generally available in less than 24 hours. But it still takes a while until a health department-ordered quarantine can be implemented. “
[Alle aktuellen Entwicklungen in Folge der Coronavirus-Pandemie finden Sie hier in unserem Newsblog. Über die Entwicklungen speziell in Berlin halten wir Sie an dieser Stelle auf dem Laufenden.]
This delay was one of the main reasons why the decision was made on the afternoon of April 27 along with the health department and the fire department to immediately evacuate all remaining residents of the facility. The other reason was the “extremely erratic course of infection,” as Heide calls it. So they wanted to start the evacuation as soon as possible. “I am very grateful for the quick and comprehensive help from the fire and health department,” says Heide.
Firefighters: “Many more people with symptoms were found”
“We have had several missions in the nursing home in the past few days,” fire department spokesman Frederic Finner told Tagesspiegel on Tuesday morning. On Monday, three patients with the worst condition were rushed to the hospital during the day, and four people were at the weekend.
“In the additional alarm, we sent a so-called scout vehicle and a doctor on call to examine the general situation and observe residents,” said the fire department spokesman. At this point, the positive tests were already known. “Since we encountered many more people with symptoms, we had to assume that several more, if not all, were infected,” Finner explained.
Therefore, the situation was treated as if all residents were affected, and, in consultation with the Secretary of State for Nursing, Barbara König (SPD), it was decided to take the remaining 73 people to hospitals because it was not possible to know for sure if On-site supply can be guaranteed.
The campaign started around 10 p.m. on Monday night and continued until 5 a.m. on Tuesday morning. The evacuation was not easy, said director of nursing Heide. “Some residents were afraid, others had to be mobilized before they could be relocated.”
Residents were transferred to various Berlin hospitals by ambulance, where they were quarantined. This also applies to the 53 older adults, for whom the result of the first evaluation was negative. All would be evaluated upon admission to the hospital and again a few days later. That is the time they are quarantined at the clinic. When the first residents can return to the residential complex is still unclear, Heide says. That is up to the health department.
So far, there are no cases of coronavirus in the other residential complexes.
Four nurses from the nursing service also tested positive for the virus and were quarantined, Heide said. “They are in good health.” There are also two other suspected cases that are isolated in the home. They have a total of 120 employees.
[InthebulletinsofourpeoplewereportweeklyonthetwodistrictsofBerlinincludingthecurrentdevelopmentsinthecoronaviruspandemicYoucanrequestthefreenewsletterhere:[InunserenLeute-NewsletternberichtenwirwöchentlichausdenzwölfBerlinerBezirkenunteranderemüberdieaktuellenEntwicklungeninderCoronavirus-PandemieDieNewsletterkönnenSiehierkostenlosbestellen:[EnlosboletinesdenuestragenteinformamossemanalmentedelosdocedistritosdeBerlínincluyendolosdesarrollosactualesenlapandemiadecoronavirusPuedesolicitarelboletíndeformagratuitaaquí:[InunserenLeute-NewsletternberichtenwirwöchentlichausdenzwölfBerlinerBezirkenunteranderemüberdieaktuellenEntwicklungeninderCoronavirus-PandemieDieNewsletterkönnenSiehierkostenlosbestellen:people.tagesspiegel.de]
Heide says there have been no confirmed cases of infection in the other six residential complexes managed by his company. According to the Senate Health Administration, residents of these residential complexes should now also be tested for the coronavirus.
Health Administration Negotiates Large-Scale Testing in Homes
Fatoş Topaç, nursing and social spokesperson for the Green Group in the Berlin House of Representatives, goes even further. It requires that all residents of Berlin’s nursing homes and homes for the elderly be screened for the coronavirus. That affects about 30,000 people. “Then we have an accurate overview and we can decide individual protection measures against the virus.”
In Berlin’s nursing homes, 186 residents and 98 employees have been found to be infected with the novel coronavirus. 38 residents died of an illness, said Senate Health Administration spokesman Moritz Quiske. According to him, a total of 48 facilities are affected. According to Quiske, the administration has been negotiating with the associations responsible for large-scale testing in nursing facilities on a voluntary basis for a few days.
Patient protection: Assisted living is particularly susceptible to infection
In the current case, however, it is not a nursing home, but a residential complex. “Unlike nursing homes, these apartments are considered private apartments. However, people who need long-term care often live together here in an enclosed space, ”explained the Executive Council of the German Patient Protection Foundation, Eugen Brysch, in an interview with the German Press Agency.
In the Corona crisis, the outbreak of a chain of infection in assisted living has the same consequences as in a nursing home. Here, too, the same nursing staff cared for many residents. “However, it is not legally possible to issue an entry ban or activate home supervision,” Brysch said. In practice, residents experienced the same lack of protection against infection as everyone who needs care and lives at home, but with the highest risk of living wall-to-wall in a high-risk group. (with dpa)
