Partly Cloudy, 77°
Weather sponsored by:

Signature Health residents get surprise visit from CCSO deputies

By Bruce Hope bruce@opcfla.com
Posted 8/12/20

ORANGE PARK – Signature Health Care in Orange Park is doing everything it can to take care of, entertain, and generally lighten the environment for its assisted living residents. With the COVID-19 …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

Log in

Don't have an ID?


Print subscribers

If you're a print subscriber, but do not yet have an online account, click here to create one.

Non-subscribers

Click here to see your options for subscribing.

Single day pass

You also have the option of purchasing 24 hours of access, for $1.00. Click here to purchase a single day pass.

Signature Health residents get surprise visit from CCSO deputies


Posted

ORANGE PARK – Signature Health Care in Orange Park is doing everything it can to take care of, entertain, and generally lighten the environment for its assisted living residents. With the COVID-19 pandemic limiting, if not eliminating visitors and trips, keeping the residents engaged and happy is a difficult task.

So, the Clay County Sheriff’s Office made a house call.

Director of Activities Barbara Nicholls and the rest of the staff at Signature work tirelessly to try to make that happen. They are creative in coming up with different ways to provide new and different interactions.

One of those interactions was having a recent window visit for the residents by members of the sheriff’s office.

Officers visited the facility last Wednesday, Aug. 6, and they met with residents by walking around the building and stopping at their windows.

“I was trying to think of things to do because right now, it’s so hard with all this epidemic going on,” Nicholls said. “I saw the police riding around one day, going around saying hi to people, so I thought, well maybe they could come here and go to our windows. So I called and asked the sheriff, and he said, yea, that would be great. He said, ‘Give me a date and a time, and we’ll just come around and say hi and wave to people in the windows.’ And that’s what they did.”

Nicholls says there were several deputies there, and that they were very well received by the residents.

“They were just laughing; they were smiling. I mean, they really enjoyed it,” she said. “It was just something outside. Something different going on. They [the officers] were amazing, and our residents were laughing; they thought it was really special.”

Nicholls told the residents in advance the officers would be coming by to see them, to build their excitement for the event. It worked. Some of the patients wanted to know why they were coming; Nicholls told them that the officers were coming because they knew how hard it’s been on them not being able to have visitors or get out.

The officers really enjoyed the trip as well, according to Nicholls and her assistant, Tiffany Nesmith.

“I know there were about eight officers that came out,” said Nesmith. “They were very into the patients, waving and smiling and making sure that they [the patients] had a smile on their faces before they left. They are very funny guys. Good to be around; they made me laugh the whole time.”

“They were so, so nice,” Nicholls said. “They were so happy to be able to help. They said that they would like to come back someday and maybe help decorate some wheelchairs.” The officers brought gift bags with hand sanitizer and other knick-knacks. “They went out of their way to do this, and it was like 103 degrees outside. It was hot. They were fantastic.”