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Hospital Family Presence and Visitation

As we move into a post-pandemic era, hospitals all over the world are reassessing visitation restrictions that were necessary to protect patients and staff from infection and help prevent the spread of COVID-19.

While visitation was limited, many South Carolina hospitals observed a number of benefits, including quiet time for patients to rest, a more peaceful or productive work environment, and enhanced security. However, we know that patients benefit from the presence of family or support persons during hospitalization. To that end, SCHA formed a task force, made up of 16 hospital leaders with diverse expertise and perspectives, to develop templates, best practices and other resources to help hospitals design visitation programs that best suit local needs.

These recommendations are designed to protect patient safety, privacy and quality of care while also encouraging the involvement of designated family and support partners as members of the care team. We encourage hospitals to limit social visitors and consider alternatives such as virtual technology or post-discharge visits.

For a detailed explanation of the task force’s recommendation, see our Hospital Family Presence and Visitation Road Map. The following resources are also available as a communications toolkit:

SCHA sincerely thanks all of the members of the task force for their time, careful deliberations, and substantive work product. The task force included the following hospital leaders:

  • Gayle Resetar, Chair | Tidelands Health
  • Dan Allen | McLeod Health
  • Sue Bennett | Roper St. Francis
  • Corey Bishop | Newberry County Memorial Hospital
  • Todd Bridges | Spartanburg Regional Healthcare System
  • Maura Callanan | MUSC
  • Cindy Causey | McLeod Health
  • Stacy Collier | Kershaw Health
  • Caroline Delongchamps | MUSC
  • Matt Desmond | Roper St. Francis
  • Tammy Gillespie| AnMed Health
  • Eric Muhlbaier | Aiken Regional Medical Center
  • Todd O’Quinn | AnMed Health
  • Doug Rhodin | Beaufort Memorial Hospital
  • Connie Steed | Prisma Health
  • Amy Stevens | Tidelands Health

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