Over the last few weeks, we’ve been working on ways to engage family members in the treatment of patients- as part of our continuing efforts to promote a culture of care at the hospital that reflects recovery and resilience.  One of those ways is to make sure that our policies make it easier for family members to visit the hospital… and our teams have been working on a new visitation policy for the last few weeks.  It may sound like an easy task to just change a policy- but there are actually lots of details that need to be worked out before the changes can occur.  Things like…  Do we have the right number of staff on at the right time?  How do we make it work so that family members can enjoy a meal at the hospital?  Are there any new safety and security issues we need to take into consideration? 

Our hospital team worked through those kinds of questions- and Monday we’ll be rolling out our new expanded visitation hours including a more friendly visitation protocol with more flexible criteria for food and gifts.  We think it’ll help create a more therapeutic environment for the patients and will make it easier for family members to participate in the Recovery process.  Here are some answers to frequently asked questions about the new visitation policy and hours.