The area’s first hospice unit for dying, hospitalized coronavirus patients opened at Metairie’s East Jefferson General Hospital this week, a move that allows loved ones of people fatally stricken with the disease to be at their bedsides — in protective gear — during their final moments.

Authorized by the state to operate through June, the 15-bed ward received its first several patients Thursday, said a spokeswoman for Heart of Hospice, which partnered with East Jefferson and Bridgepoint Continuing Care Hospital to create the unit.

The spokeswoman, Kimberly Workman, said Saturday that new patients have arrived daily as the New Orleans area continued grappling with the novel coronavirus pandemic.

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In Jefferson Parish and neighboring New Orleans alone, the virus had sickened at least 11,496 people, including 599 who have died, according to state officials.

COVID-19 — the respiratory illness brought on by the coronavirus — is highly contagious, so patients sick with it are treated in isolation. As the disease spread around the world to New Orleans, heart-wrenching stories have emerged of dying patients separated from their loved ones for lengthy stretches before only being able to say goodbye over video telephone calls.

The daughter of former New Orleans Saints kicker Tom Dempsey, who died of COVID-19 at age 73 in an Uptown nursing home earlier this month, said having to be separated from her father for much of the end of his life compounded the pain of what was already her family’s most difficult experience.

“We just wanted to be there so he knew we hadn’t left him, hadn’t forgotten him,” Ashley Dempsey said minutes after receiving the phone call informing her of her father’s death.

At the new temporary ward in East Jefferson, visitors will be able to spend time at the hospital with their loved ones after being given equipment designed to protect them from contagion.

“We know that this is our time to provide care to vulnerable patients and families when it matters most, regardless of barriers that might stand in the way,” said Dr. Sonali Wilborn, chief medical officer of South Carolina-based Heart of Hospice. “We are confident that we have the resources required to keep our teams, as well as our patients’ loved ones, as protected as possible while they provide care.”

Nurses, chaplains, social workers, certified nursing assistants, and others from Heart of Hospice’s five-state network volunteered to relocate and staff the temporary ward at East Jefferson. Medicare, Medicaid and most private insurers cover hospice, the group said.

State statistics show various closures and event cancellations since last month have slowed the spread of COVID-19.

Notably, for a fifth consecutive day, the numbers fell for people who were hospitalized as well as on ventilators, machines which keep alive those who are having trouble breathing because of the virus.

A total of 1,761 people battling the virus in Louisiana were hospitalized, down from 1,888 on Friday. There were 347 people on ventilators, down from Friday's toll of 363 and the fewest since state officials began releasing data on that statistic on March 29.

But states have been under pressure to ease the restrictions amid a precipitous economic decline nationwide, even though health experts say doing so would likely spike the rate of infections and hospitalizations.

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