Spectrum Health relaxing COVID-era visitor restrictions at West Michigan hospitals

GRAND RAPIDS — BHSH Spectrum Health West Michigan announced this week it is revising visitor policies and lifting some pandemic-era restrictions in hospitals and outpatient locations.

Visiting minors, individuals 15 and younger, will now be allowed to visit adult and pediatric patients. They must be with a supervising adult during regular visiting hours and able to adhere to masking requirements.

Additionally, overnight visitors will now be allowed for non-COVID patients who are in private rooms. Minors are not currently allowed to be overnight visitors, however.

Several visitor guidelines have been updated to allow more visitors as well. Adult  inpatient, labor and delivery, OB triage and cath lab patients can now have four visitors, which can be different people each day.

Adult emergency department, urgent care, surgery and endoscopy patients can have two visitors, as can those in pediatric emergency department, surgery, lab and radiology areas. Adult lab and radiology patients can have one visitor.

Minors visiting neonatal ICU patients must be a sibling of the patient. Visitors under 12 are not permitted in the bone marrow transplant unit at Butterworth Hospital.

Inpatient COVID-19 patients may have two adult visitors, age 16 or older, who must be the same people throughout the patient’s stay.

All visitors will still be asked to use appropriate PPE at all times and consistently wear an acceptable, clean, well-fitting mask if able.

The new guidelines are in effect for more than a dozen Spectrum Health hospitals, including Zeeland Community Hospital and the system’s Grand Rapids locations.

Full guidelines can be found at spectrumhealth.org/covid19/family-and-visitor-restrictions.

This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Visitor rules relaxed at Spectrum Health West Michigan locations