After 7 months, 2 sisters finally allowed to visit mother at SC nursing home

LANCASTER, S.C. — Mandy Chester and her sister, Tori Teal, sat outside the White Oak Manor nursing home Monday morning waiting for their mother, who they have not seen in person for seven months.

“Feel good to be outside?” Teal asked her mother, Helen Hayes, who was wheeled outside to a large blue “X” on the ground.

“Yes, it does,” her mother answered.

Teal and her sister made the first appointment on the first day that visits were allowed at White Oak in Lancaster.

South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster made an announcement on Sept. 1 that nursing homes could begin to have visitors outside.

However, the main requirement was the facility must not have new positive COVID-19 tests among staff and residents for two weeks. White Oak has finally been able to achieve that.

“They had a week where they had no cases, so we got our hopes up. Then the following week they had a case,” Teal said.

If there is a positive case, family members must wait another two weeks.

[Local assisted-living facility taking precautions to keep residents safe from coronavirus]

The state guidelines were later revised to allow indoor visits as well. For that to happen, the positive test rate in the county where the facility is located must be below 10%, which is the case in Lancaster County, so indoor visits are allowed at White Oak.

Visitations are held in the lobby just inside the door.

There are no visits allowed in residents rooms at this time.

White Oak planned on allowing visitors, and sent a written plan to the state detailing how it will manage visits.

In the plan, the facility wanted to ease the burden on families and their residents.

Each visitor checks in with a nurse, answers health questions, wears a mask and sanitizes their hands.

The visits are under an overhang that is roped off and located outside the entrance.

One family is allowed at the location at a time.

Hayes sat six feet away on the other side of a railing.

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Her daughters sat apart in chairs, and there was a box of tissues on a table between them.

Sunday was Hayes' 70th birthday, so Chester held up birthday cards for her mother to see.

Hayes got COVID-19 and the sisters worried they wouldn’t see her again.

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Chester checked on her mother before she could see her in person.

“I even came over here one night and stayed in the parking lot for several hours crying when she had COVID,” Chester said “Just thinking I just need to be here if something was to happen, because we had not seen her in so long.”

Hayes has since recovered and got the opportunity Monday to sit with her daughters, smiling and talking about Clemson University football.

The sisters said one thing was missing.

“I just can’t wait until we can hug her soon, hopefully,” Teal said.

Most SC nursing homes still not allowing families to visit loved ones

Cox Media Group