SERIOUS CHARACTERISTICS: Marianne Stenberg, manager of the nursing home Villa Skaar Valstad, fears that they will lose even more of the elderly residents to the virus. On Monday, one of the infected died at the nursing home. Photo: Terje Bringedal
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The staff at the nursing home must have done everything they were supposed to. Nevertheless, 19 out of 23 residents and 13 employees were infected at the same time – without symptoms.
– This is a real nightmare to face. We have all the way closely monitored any symptoms in employees and residents, precisely because this is what we have been afraid will happen, says Marianne Stenberg, manager at the nursing home Villa Skaar Valstad to VG.
On Tuesday night, it became known that 19 out of 23 residents at the nursing home in Eidsvoll have tested positive on the coronavirus. At the same time, 13 employees at the nursing home also tested positive.
Monday died one of the infected residents. Together they have an average age of 78 years.
The infection was only discovered after an employee tested positive. The employee had not been at work with symptoms, and isolated and tested himself immediately after suspicion of infection.
Not a single one of the infected residents had signs of symptoms of the virus when the positive samples became known.
This worries the municipal superior.
– These are vulnerable individuals who do everything they can to protect, but it has proven to be very difficult with a virus that is transmitted before you get symptoms, says municipal chief physician Carl Magnus Jensen.
– We must prepare for the fact that it may become even more serious.
– Has infected violently
VG meets manager Stenberg in the doorway to the now closed nursing home. She is wearing full infection control equipment.
Stenberg says that they are now in the middle of the nightmare of all nursing homes today, and calls it a desperate situation with many quarantined employees, sick residents and a strict infection control regime.
See more photos in the photo gallery:
INSULATED: All the residents at Villa Skaar Valstad are now sitting in isolation in their respective rooms at the nursing home after the virus outbreak became known. Marianne Stenberg says that it is the challengers to explain the situation to many of the elderly.
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– We were really well prepared, both in accordance with routines, preventive measures, equipment and everything. But still we got it in. And it has been very contagious, says Stenberg.
She was surprised when so many tested positive at the same time.
– Since neither employees nor residents have had symptoms, we have not suspected anything, the manager says.
Now, however, more have started to get bad. Her biggest concern right now is that the condition of some of the elderly is deteriorating and that they will lose more.
– Now we see more coughing, more pain in the body and reduced appetite among the residents, says Stenberg, who has been a nurse and manager for several years.
Tested 70 people in one day
Municipal chief physician Jensen was notified of the infection to the employee at the nursing home on the morning of 4 November. During the day, two more employees at the same nursing home tested positive.
– No outbreak or problem was acknowledged yet in the situation then, the municipal chief explains.
However, he immediately decided to test all employees and residents at Villa Skaar Valstad. In one day, they tested 70 pieces.
In the following days comes the sad news. A dozen residents test positive, in addition to several employees. He finds it difficult to say how long it may have been an infection in the nursing home before it was discovered.
On Wednesday 11 November, a total of 32 employees and residents were infected at the nursing home.
– New cases may still appear due to the incubation time of the virus, the municipal chief explains.
New nursing home hit
After the infection at the nursing home was discovered, the municipality started infection detection of close contacts.
Then it is discovered that staff at the private nursing home Villa Skaar Valstad, have also worked at two other municipal institutions during the contagious period.
Employees and residents of these institutions were quickly quarantined and tested.
– Now, two more infected patients and one employee at the one municipal nursing home, Vilberg health park, have been identified. It is a large nursing home with approximately 110 residents, says municipal chief Jensen.
Jensen points out that none of the employees or residents at the other municipal institution, Pålsjordet bokollektiv, have been infected.
He emphasizes that the outbreak can simply be about bad luck, and fears that health professionals will refuse to test themselves if we become too preoccupied with blaming something or someone.
– My impression is that the nursing homes have had good routines all the way. Nevertheless, they have been infected in the nursing home. It can happen to anyone, says Jensen.
—FEARS OF SPREADING: Municipal chief physician in Eidsvoll municipality, Carl Magnus Jensen, says that the biggest concern now is whether they are able to limit the infection that has come to the large nursing home in the municipality. Photo: Terje Bringedal
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Fear new virus variant
Villa Skaar’s managing director, Richard Skaar Thorsrud, says that the employees have at times used face masks since the pandemic broke out.
– All visits to our homes have been bandaged since March, he explains.
Just before the infection in the nursing homes was revealed last week, it was decided in the emergency group in Villa Skaar that all employees in all our homes should wear face masks, Thorsrud explains to VG.
However, the municipal supervisor does not believe that it is the use or not of the use of face masks that is decisive here.
He thinks it is difficult to explain how the infection has entered and spread so quickly.
– It may have something to do with the fact that you are good at having infection control routines that protect patients, but do not necessarily have the same attention within staff groups, Jensen explains.
– But it can also be a virus variant that is very contagious and transmitted quickly, and that older people have atypical symptoms that make it difficult to detect.
—FOLLOW-UP: Villa Skaar’s CEO, Richard Skaar Thorsrud, works closely with his employees at the various nursing homes he runs. Here with professional leader, Aleksandra Saran. Photo: Terje Bringedal
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Jensen has now contacted the National Institute of Public Health to take a closer look at the outbreak at the nursing home.
At present, it is difficult for him to assess what may have been done differently to prevent an outbreak.
– Now we must remember to remind each other of good infection control towards patients, but also among employees. I think we got a little tired of a summer where the only consequence for Norwegians was that we went to Nordmøre instead of Nice.
– It’s a bad reminder of how bad things can go.
Published: 11.11.20 kl. 23:07
Updated: 12.11.20 kl. 00:15
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