This study aims to assess changes in long-term care (LTC) residents’ quality of life (QoL) before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. A pre-test post-test study of 49 QoL measures, across four dimensions from the interRAI self-reported QoL survey, was conducted. Secondary data from 2019 (n = 116) and 2020 (n = 128) were analysed to assess the change in QoL. A significant decline in 12 measures was observed, indicating a change in QoL of LTC residents during the pandemic. Social life was the dimension mostly affected with residents reporting less opportunities to spend time with like-minded residents, explore new skills and interests, participate in meaningful religious activities, and have enjoyable things to do in the evenings. Several measures of personal control, staff responsiveness and care, and safety also demonstrated a significant change. The results can inform future strategies for pandemic and outbreak preparedness. Balancing the safety of residents with attention to their QoL should be a priority moving forward.

The COVID-19 pandemic has taken a devastating toll on long-term care (LTC) residents, families, and staff. In an effort to keep residents safe from COVID-19, public health measures were implemented early in the pandemic to restrict visitation with residents in many countries, with subsequent adjustments made over the course of the pandemic. It is critical to understand the implementation process and how restrictions on visitations have impacted residents, families, and staff. This research note shares a summary of research interviews conducted with key informants in British Columbia (Canada), England (United Kingdom), and The Netherlands on the implementation of visitation programs in the COVID-19 context. It highlights leading practices and key challenges from these jurisdictions.

Our study aimed to explore how perceived baseline contact may influence acceptability of Connecting Today, a personal contact intervention, among people living with dementia. We aimed to generate hypotheses for testing in future studies. This was a sub-group analysis of pilot study data. Fifteen people living with mild to moderate dementia participated in Connecting Today. We explored how perceptions of intervention acceptability may differ in groups reporting weekly contact (n = 8) compared with groups reporting monthly/unknown (n = 7) contact at baseline. Measures of acceptability included a treatment perceptions and preferences questionnaire, and the number of and reasons for non-consent, missing data, and study withdrawal. We used descriptive statistics and content analysis. In visits one and two, a larger proportion (85.7–100%) of low baseline contact participants reported feeling better, and indicated that the visits helped them and were easy “mostly” or “a lot”, compared with the high baseline contact group (37.5–62.5%). Most missing data (71%) and all study withdrawals occurred in the high baseline contact group. Scheduled in-person visits with family, friends, or a volunteer may appeal to residents in care homes who have few existing opportunities for routine, one-on-one visits with others. Hypotheses generated should be tested in future studies.