Here to Care for You

Yes, we are happy to welcome back visitors. Please note these guidelines are for hospitalized patients who qualify for visitors and are not in our Emergency Department or here to have a baby. Please scroll down for those separate visitation guidelines. 

• To provide comfort and support to your loved one, you may visit our hospital as follows: 
  • 1 visitor per patient, once patient is in a private room.
  • You must attest to being symptom-free of illness and clear a hospital screening point at entry. 
  • You must sign a waiver for visitation.
  • You must wear a hospital-issued mask properly and stay six feet from others at all times. 
  • No in / out – once you are settled into the patient room, you must stay there for the duration of your visit. 
  • For your safety, patients must have test results that indicate it is safe for them to have a visitor. 

At this time visitation does not apply to: 

• COVID-19 positive patients, except at the end of life. 
• Intensive Care patients who are in the Adult PICU or PACU surge areas. Every effort will be made to move the patient to a private room when possible so they may safely have a visitor. 
• Maternal Child Health areas have separate visitor policies. To learn more, click the links for the following areas:
  • Labor and Delivery, Maternity
  • Pediatrics
  • NICU
• Procedural Patients without an assigned private hospital room. 
• Della Martin Center patients. 

Steps for visitation: 

• Upon clearing a screening point, visitors will: 
  • Go to the front desk  
  • Carefully review and sign the visitation waiver 
  • Provide identification and a phone number where you can be reached during your visit  
  • Receive your visitor sticker that notes the time your visit will conclude 
  • Set a timer on your smartphone to be reminded when your visit concludes 
  • Place your sticker above your waist and below your shoulder, and ensure it is visible at all times during your visit. 
  • When your visit is over, please sign out at the front desk and hand in your visitor sticker 

• Any visitor who exhibits signs and symptoms of illness will not be granted entrance. 
• No food from the outside is permitted out of an abundance of caution. 
• Children under the age of 15 may not visit the hospital because of infection prevention concerns. 
• We reserve the right to ask permitted visitors to leave at any time. Disruptive individuals will be asked to leave campus immediately.  
• We may close to visitors at any time, without prior notice, based on community infection rates or hospital guidelines. 

Staying connected outside of visiting hours, or when you are unable to visit: 

• If your hospitalized family member is able to communicate on their own, we ask that you please contact them directly. 
• If you would like to speak with the care team, we ask that families of hospitalized patients please designate only ONE family member to call the hospital. This helps limit the number of phone calls and keeps our focus on providing direct patient care. 
• We ask that the designated family member kindly refrain from calling during shift change (6:30 a.m. – 8 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m.), as this is when care teams are sharing important patient information with the incoming shift. 

Guidelines for Other Areas of Care 

• Maternal Child Health: Visitation guidelines for the following areas can be found by clicking these links:
  • Labor and Delivery, Maternity
  • Pediatrics
  • NICU
• Procedural patients, including outpatient or same day surgery, GI lab, radiology, and catheterization lab: 
• One healthy visitor may drop off and pick up all patients having procedures who require assistance (cannot walk, communicate clearly etc.). This accommodation for a visitor of a procedural patient who requires assistance must be arranged in advance on the pre-operative phone call 
  • You must sign a waiver for visitation.
  • To minimize exposure, visitor cannot accompany patient to the unit or procedural area. Upon clearing the illness screening to gain access to the campus, the visitor can help the patient to the registration area but then must leave the campus. 
• All other procedural patients can be dropped off outside of the main entrance to the hospital. 
• Upon completion of the patient’s procedure, the family will be called and notified of next steps related to when the patient will be ready to go home and instructions for how to reunite with the patient at the hospital so they may go home. 

Visitors in the Emergency Department (ED)

• To provide comfort and support to your loved one, you may visit our ED as follows: 
  • Patients not showing signs or symptoms of COVID-19 may have one healthy visitor. 
  • Patients who are high suspicion for COVID-19 cannot have visitors for everyone’s safety. 
  • We may make exceptions for patients at the end of life or for extraordinary circumstances, however that is the decision of the care team. 
  • Anyone unable to respect our visiting policies, including disruptive individuals, will be asked to leave. 
  • To ensure physical distancing in our lobby, we ask that visitors please wait in the car until the patient has been taken back into a room.  
    • Of course, parents may wait with their children.  
    • Any patient who requires assistance may have a visitor wait with them, given distancing in the lobby is possible. 

End of Life Visitation: 

• Patients receiving end-of-life care may have a one-time visit from a loved one upon approval from the house supervisor. 
• Guidelines for end of life visitation for COVID-19 positive and rule-out patients are based on health authority recommendations related to exposure and include: 
  • Two visitors per patient only. 
  • Visitor must sign waiver related to exposure risk. 
  • Visits will need to be staggered based on unit activity, visitor must be flexible to that changing and unpredictable nature. 
  • Visitors must agree to follow all policies and requirements for visitation, including successful completion of illness screening at entry point and proper use of PPE while on campus 
  • Upon clearing screening, visitors will be escorted to the unit and, upon conclusion of visit, be escorted directly out of the hospital to minimize exposure to others. 
  • Visits are restricted to be no more than 30 minutes in length to reduce exposure. 
  • Visitors must remain in patient’s room during the visit (no in-and-out of the unit, this is to help preserve PPE) 
  • Thank you for your patience and understanding. Our policies are guided by the safety of our healthcare workers, the safety of our community and preservation of PPE as this pandemic evolves. 
• We revisit this policy weekly based on guidance from health authorities, availability of PPE, COVID-19 patient census, infection thresholds in the community at large, and the advice of our infectious disease specialists. 

You can find this visitor policy and more visitor information on our Visitors page.