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Protecting long-term care residents from outbreaks requires different infrastructure, proper staffing conditions and a culture of quality assurance, researchers have found.
The experts further determined that designing smaller, more homelike spaces would minimize the spread of viruses while promoting better health and quality of life for residents.
"Community outbreaks and lack of personal protective equipment were the primary drivers of outbreak occurrence in long-term care homes, and the built environment was the major determinant of outbreak severity," said George Heckman, a professor in Waterloo's School of Public Health and Health Systems and Schlegel Research Chair in Geriatric Medicine with the Research Institute for Aging.