Nearly a third of Christian Health Center’s residents have contracted COVID-19, but so far no one at the Hopkinsville nursing home has become seriously ill from the coronavirus, said Christian Care Communities President and CEO Mary Lynn Spalding.
Spalding, who oversees the group’s nursing home and senior living properties in nine Kentucky cities, commented on the coronavirus outbreak Monday shortly after community members staged two car parades in front of Christian Health Center.
Led by a city fire truck and ambulance, the parade was meant to show support for employees and residents. Several staff members came outside and waved from the sidewalk as vehicles passed slowly through the horseshoe drive. Curtains were pulled back so some residents could watch through their room windows.
The Rev. Wade Miller, pastor of First Christian Church, said a prayer for the staff and asked for God’s strength for residents, employees and families affected by the virus.
Spalding said the employees are “servants and heroes” because they care for sick elderly residents even though they risk becoming infected with the virus and could carry it home to their own families.
“We were very successful in keeping it out of the building for a long time. Because of our weekly, proactive testing, when it did appear we were able to find it early and contain it,” she said.
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The nursing home has 92 residents and close to 200 staff members.
As of Monday afternoon, there were 30 active patient cases and six active staff cases at the facility, according to the Kentucky Department of Public Health. Six other employees were classified as recovered.
Spalding said the nursing home began testing patients in March. The first positive results were reported on Sept. 2.
Most of the patients who have tested positive were asymptomatic and many of them were in the same wing.
“Normally people get sick and then they are tested,” Spalding said.
Confirming positive cases before residents had symptoms made it possible to “contain” the virus and shift additional care to those residents, said Spalding.
Christian Health Center has four wings, and the building’s design makes it possible to enter and exit each wing without going through the main entrance or other parts of the building.
As patients have tested positive, they have been isolated. The facility is not accepting new admissions.
Spalding said the nursing home has not been able to pinpoint how the virus entered the property.
“We may never know,” she said. “This particular county has become a hotspot.”
Approximately 7% of Kentucky’s confirmed COVID-19 cases have been among residents of skilled nursing facilities. But the death toll has been much greater. Fifty-six percent of the state’s 1,065 coronavirus related deaths have been nursing home residents, according to the Kentucky database on coronavirus in long-term care facilities.
Jennifer P. Brown is co-founder, publisher and editor of Hoptown Chronicle. You can reach her at editor@hoptownchronicle.org. Brown was a reporter and editor at the Kentucky New Era, where she worked for 30 years. She is a co-chair of the national advisory board to the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues, governing board past president for the Kentucky Historical Society, and co-founder of the Kentucky Open Government Coalition. She serves on the Hopkinsville History Foundation's board.
