Visitors can again stay overnight with patients at Duke hospitals in the Triangle
For the first time in 15 months, patients at Duke Health’s three hospitals in the Triangle can have a visitor spend the night in their rooms.
The change in policy, effective Monday, is the latest sign that the coronavirus pandemic is loosening its grip on everyday life. Duke Health officials say decreased spread of the coronavirus in the community and increased vaccination means it’s no longer necessary to prohibit overnight visitors.
Katie Galbraith, president of Duke Regional Hospital in Durham, said Duke also recognizes that friends, family or other designated visitors are important to a person’s recovery.
“Visitors are actually good medicine,” Galbraith said. “Having loved ones present in the hospital is really important to our patients and their loved ones.”
The change applies to Duke Regional and Duke University hospitals in Durham and Duke Raleigh Hospital. Overnight visitors are allowed only in single-occupancy rooms and must remain in the room during their visit.
Duke is catching up with the two other hospital systems in the Triangle, UNC Health and WakeMed, which already allowed overnight visitors. All three systems allow only one overnight visitor at a time.
The move is the latest to ease visiting restrictions that date back to March 2020. As the coronavirus pandemic took hold in North Carolina, Duke, UNC and WakeMed jointly announced strict no-visitor polices as part of a broader strategy to try to keep from being overrun with COVID-19 patients, as hospitals had been in China, Italy and New York.
Triangle hospitals began to let visitors back in on a limited basis last summer. WakeMed now allows up to four visitors per day, though no more than two at a time, while Duke, UNC Medical Center in Chapel Hill and UNC Rex in Raleigh allow two visitors per patient.
Policies for COVID-19 patients vary. Duke and WakeMed are still not allowing people to visit patients with COVID-19, except in “end-of-life” situations, while UNC and Rex now allow COVID-19 patients to designate one person to visit while they’re in the hospital.
Hospitals are seeing fewer COVID-19 patients as more people become vaccinated. On Monday, the state Department of Health and Human Services reported that fewer than 500 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 statewide, down from a peak of nearly 4,000 in mid January.
Visitor policy details vary from hospital to hospital and between hospitals, outpatient clinics, emergency departments and children’s wards. For details about visitor policies, go to:
▪ Duke Health: www.dukehealth.org/VisitorRestrictions
▪ WakeMed: www.wakemed.org/visitor-information
▪ UNC Health: www.unchealthcare.org/coronavirus/unc-health-visitor-restrictions/
