South Florida Hospitals Relax Visitation Policies As COVID Cases Subside
MIAMI (CBSMiami) - COVID-19 cases are continuing to trend down and because of that, South Florida hospitals are starting to relax their visitation policies.
Broward Health, announced Wednesday, they're in the green phase, which means pre-pandemic visitation policies.
Simply put, it means more friends and family members will be allowed inside to visit loved ones.
CBS Miami spoke to some people who said this is a huge relief, one they have been waiting for.
"It'll brighten spirits and give people hope. Things like that. People need to have that in there," said Anthony Livingston.
Allowing multiple friends and family members to visit means patients will always have an advocate and constant support to help them heal.
"Not having the ability to go in and put your hand on their shoulder, see them, speak with them, that really caused a lot of angst with our patients," says Joshua Lenchus, a doctor and regional medical officer at Broward Health.
Livingston lost a close friend not too long ago and because of restrictions, he was unable to say goodbye.
"We couldn't go see him and he passed away. It was terrible. He was a pretty good friend of mine, and we weren't allowed in. I've always regretted that, not being able to go see him," said Livingston.
The last time Broward Health was on level green was four months ago in October but that didn't last long. Omicron hit shortly after.
"As each successive wave of variants come through, we hope that we don't have to continue to pivot with our visitation and we learn to grow with it," says Lenchus.
We checked in with other major hospitals.
At Jackson Memorial, you can have multiple visitors per day but only one person in a patient's room.
At Memorial Regional and Baptist Health, only one visitor is allowed to see a patient and at Nicklaus Children's Hospital, two adults are allowed in every patient's room.
"This gives us a new sense of what post covid normalcy will be," says Lenchus.
Patients and family members tell us, they're hoping to see pre-pandemic visitation policies at all hospitals soon.
As COVID cases continue to decrease, visitation policies at hospitals are likely to change.
Here are some links so you can take a closer look at the policies in place: