With the province moving through a phased reopening, families are able to visit loved ones in hospital for the first time since April 3.
Barbara Janz and her son Zach are welcoming the opportunity to see her husband ahead of his heart surgery. They immediately started planning the visit to Calgary’s South Health Campus after hearing the announcement from Alberta Health Services.
“Let’s go. Let’s jump in the car and get down here,” Barbara said.
They hoped the visit would help with the outcome of the surgery.
“It’s going to be good,” she told Global News. “It’s going to be uplifting for him for sure. For all of us.”
“It’s going to help him emotionally for sure,” Zach said Saturday. “He’s been having a lot of stress.”
Announced Friday, the eased restrictions come two months after Alberta Health banned visits to hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic.
It should help patients in hospital reconnect with family and ease anxiety for those who care about them.
“We know that it has been challenging for Albertans to have loved ones in hospital and perhaps not be able to visit with them,” Dr. Mark Joffe with AHS said Friday.
Emergency and urgent patients can have one designated visitor, while acute inpatients can have two. AHS has an online guide for most scenarios.
For Paul Bruneau’s wife Annette, Saturday was the first opportunity to see her mother, who has vascular dementia, face to face since mid-March.
“It’s still tough because you have to wear the mask,” Bruneau said. “So she’ll kind of recognize but not till she hears the voice and then she’ll put two and two together and probably calm down a little bit.”
The Bruneaus plan on connecting their mother with the rest of their family through video chats from her hospital room.