Long-term care operators must provide more mental health and emotional support for nursing assistants in response to the psychological and physical toll the COVID-19 pandemic has taken on them, according to new research.
Anna Pollard, right, visits with her 101-year-old grandmother, Mary Smith, at Life Care Center of West Bridgewater. (Jesse Costa/WBUR)
A plate of glass separated Mary Smith from her family when she celebrated her 100th birthday last April.
“We had to talk through the window,” Smith remembers.
The window of Smith’s nursing home stayed closed to prevent the spread of COVID-19, so the family used cell phones to communicate.
“It was hard,” says Smith’s granddaughter, Anna Pollard. “I planned this big party to celebrate her 100th birthday. And I had to, you know, cancel the whole thing and just have it be me and my husband and my kids looking at her through a window.”