New COVID-19 Clusters in Adult Care Homes

(Sedgwick County, Kan.) – Sedgwick County has partnered with three adult care homes to jointly provide an update on newly identified clusters.

Reflection Living, 1377 N. Iroquois, Wichita, 67203

• Seven cases (five residents, two staff)
• No deaths

“From day one our top priority has been to protect our residents and staff, while providing quality care for our residents,” said Regional Manager Kristy Tuner, RN. “Our staff are screened daily prior to the start of their shift and are required to wear a mask at all times. We are not allowing outside visitors, however families are allowed alternatives to stay in touch with their loved ones.  Although this is very hard for all involved, our top focus is to decrease the exposure risk as much as possible for our residents. Currently we are doing everything possible to quarantine the situation - frequent cleaning, heightened use of PPE, increased resident screening and visitation restrictions to only the most essential to meet medical needs of our residents.  

She continues, “The clinical team implemented infection control procedures following the recommended guidelines and received a zero-deficiency infection control survey in all 5 of our homes from Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services prior to the cluster.” 

Homestead of Wichita, 12221 W. Maple St., Wichita, 67235

• 18 cases (nine residents, nine staff)
• One death (resident)
• All residents and staff have been tested
• Two cycles of testing have been done

“As of this moment, Homestead of Wichita is caring for eight COVID-19 positive residents who are all currently asymptomatic, said Midwest Health Marketing Director Ali Ellis. “All eight are residents of our memory care neighborhood, which is contained area specially designed to care for seniors with Alzheimer’s and other forms of dementia. All COVID-19 positive residents on our care initially tested positive on July 17 and no additional residents have tested positive since.

Homestead of Wichita also offers assisted living in a separate area of the facility, but no assisted living residents were COVID-19 positive or tested positive for the SARS-CoV-2 virus. To mitigate the risk of transmission, no staff members are being shared between assisted living and memory care.

Two rounds of COVID-19 testing have been completed at Homestead of Wichita. The first tests on July 17 discovered there were nine residents that were COVID-19 positive while the follow-up test on July 24 determined that there were no new cases of COVID-19. The results for the second round are encouraging as no additional residents were COVID-19 positive. Although there is still the risk of the incubation period from exposure, the negative resident test results indicate infectious disease protocols are working to protect residents.”

Platinum Care Homes, 5701 E. 17^th St. N., Wichita, 67208

• Less than five cases
• No deaths
• Residents and staff will be re-tested at the end of the week

Sedgwick County investigates reports of notifiable diseases, like COVID-19. If a case is identified in an adult care home, Sedgwick County recommends that the facility isolate any symptomatic people away from other residents. Residents and staff are tested, either by the Health Department at no cost or through the facility. The facility monitors all residents and staff for symptoms. The Health Department works with the facility to ensure all close contacts are identified and are properly quarantined or isolated.

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