Our teams have been working hard to prepare for our Father’s Day celebrations this weekend, chocked full of ways to make dads feel special. Plus, this week we begin celebrating National Nursing Assistants Week, and we have been moving forward with our small group activities in phase one of our reopening plan. No doubt it has been a busy week and there is much to celebrate!

Success in Small Groups

Last week, we informed you that Aegis Living has created a comprehensive 5-phase reopening plan for all of our 32 communities. Phase one will allow for some small group activities, five or fewer people, with the hope of helping our residents return to some level of normalcy in their communities. Our Life Enrichment teams are busy creating plans for people to gather safely in activities like group walks, gardening club, and more. As we proceed forward slowly, we are monitoring everyone’s health closely and maintaining our diligent safety protocols.

Where We Stand Today

As phase one of our reopening plan cautiously gets underway, our safety protocols and daily health screenings remain our top priority. And our systems are working extremely well. We’ve been able to maintain our low number of positive cases for the fourth week in a row to just a handful companywide. Currently we have six cases of COVID-19 among our nearly 2,500 staff members and 2,200 residents. The cases are being managed at our Granada Hills community. The staff members are resting and recovering at home while the residents who tested positive are being cared for and monitored closely in their rooms. We are testing all residents and are performing contact tracing to track any other potential contact. Though our numbers show that we have been 99% virus-free since the pandemic began, we remain humbled and diligent every day by the tenacity of Covid-19 and continue to innovate to get in front of it.

Father’s Day Celebrations

Feel the buzz in the air for dads? Everyone is working hard preparing for our Father’s Day celebrations planned for this weekend. We are connecting our residents with their loved ones through gift drops offs, videos and photos. Each of our communities will have a table set up at the main entrance for families to drop off gifts and cards to be sanitized and delivered to residents. Our Life Enrichment teams are also assembling videos, created using family photos, to share with the residents. Additionally, every male resident will be gifted a copy of the National Geographic book, “Simply Beautiful Photographs” by Annie Griffiths.  And, as we mentioned in last week’s update, all of the Outdoor Living Rooms have shipped to the communities and should be available for family visits on Father’s Day. Please call your community directly and speak with the Concierge to confirm the Outdoor Living Room is ready and to schedule your visit.

Father’s Day Menu

We are also excited to be providing a specially curated menu on Sunday, for all to enjoy, that includes hearty breakfast options, delicious comfort food for lunch, and a choice of prime rib or barbeque chicken for dinner. Our hope is to make all our male residents feel loved and appreciated this Father’s Day even with the untraditional celebrations this year. We recognize how important celebrating holidays and hearing from loved ones is for our residents’ health and morale during these trying times and we sincerely appreciate everyone who is helping make these special events happen. A Happy Father’s Day goes out to all our families.

In honor of Father’s Day, we would also like to take a moment to highlight a wonderful example from our Aegis Stories. Bill and Rick are a father and son duo who embody what it means to nurture each other through the many stages of life. They show us in this sweet video how they’ve remained close through baseball, music, and Aegis Living activities.

Finally, can’t say THANK YOU loud enough to our hardworking nursing assistants in honor of National Nursing Assistant Week. Your dedication, kindness and expertise help keep our communities running smoothly and we appreciate everything you do for our residents!