Community and Rehab Care - Community Living / June 4, 2020
It is unknown how the novel Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, the cause of the current acute respiratory illness COVID-19 pandemic that has infected millions of people, affects people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). Shortly after the first COVID-19 case was reported in the U.S., a cross-functional team at BrightSpring Health Services (BHS), comprised of medical, clinical, compliance, risk management, human resources, legal, communications, and operations leaders, assembled to create an outbreak committee to develop and deploy a comprehensive prevention and suppression strategy to implement across the company. BrightSpring provides continuous support to more than 11,000 individuals with IDD nationwide.
A newly published study by the committee, “Supporting Individuals with Intellectual and Developmental Disability During the First One Hundred Days of the Covid-19 Outbreak in the U.S.” in the Journal of Intellectual Disability Research, aims to describe how individuals with IDD have been affected during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“There is great value to having a diverse team and enhanced technology ready and be able to provide care to this vulnerable population during the pandemic,” said Dr. Bill Mills, BHS Chief Medical Officer. “We were able to rapidly implement enhanced infection control measures across 2,400 homes using custom-built software, electronic resource library, mobile applications, live webinars, direct mail, and posted communications within the homes. We’re eager to share our best practices to benefit all of those in long-term care settings.”
Read the full study here.
The London School of Economics Care Policy and Evaluation Center included our study in their analysis aimed at helping the international community and long-term care COVID-19 response.
Filed under: Community and Rehab Care - Community Living, Media Hub