Northamptonshire’s hospitals hope to announce ‘new normal’ visiting rules later this week

After more than three months of strict hospital visiting restrictions, the rules for the ‘new normal’ could be announced later this week.

Senior management in charge of Northampton and Kettering General Hospitals and the Northamptonshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust are reviewing how the restrictions can be safely relaxed on adult and children's wards.

The Government announced at the start of this month that restrictions could be eased, but the local organisations decided not to make changes until they could ensure patient and staff safety and social distancing..

It is likely that the length of the visit and the number of visitors will still be restricted, and visits to Covid-19 positive patients will only be allowed on 'compassionate grounds'.

A statement on the hospital’s website said: “This week the senior management discussed and agreed to continue to review together how we could safely reduce the current visiting restrictions.

“This will not see a completely open visiting regime, but a ‘new normal’ with new rules, eg. we will probably not allow visiting, unless on compassionate grounds, to wards with Covid positive patients, and there are likely to be restrictions on the length of time of a visit, the amount of visitors, use of personal protective equipment (PPE) and social distancing in individual wards.

“We aim to have finalised these arrangements by Saturday July 4, when full details will be announced. .

“We apologise that we have not been in a position to accommodate increased visiting earlier, but we have to keep safety at the heart of all we do and want to ensure that any new changes are enabled and consistent across both hospitals.”.

The visiting changes will not apply to maternity wards. The hospitals say arrangements for those wards will be announced in due course.

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