Hello LCLA Families,
As many of you know, RSV is sweeping through the community. LCLA has experienced a significant increase in the number of cases over the last week. This isn’t unusual for this time of year. But, owners of the centers, Jessie and Becky, are both in Nursing leadership positions at American Family Children’s Hospital and Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin. This week they each received information about hospitals reaching bed capacity.
The wellness and safety of your children in our centers is our number one priority. We are connected to the larger medical community too and want to help support our local health care workers by doing our part to limit spread of all illnesses. We will be updating our health guidelines to reflect the recommendations of the local pediatric specialists in regards to increased cases of RSV. Information to support these changes can be found here. This link also includes health and safety practices you can put in place at home to limit exposure. We will also be using them in the centers. You will see increased cleaning and sanitizing in all rooms. You may see staff members increase their mask wearing as well for non-COVID related reasons.
We are asking you to help us by doing the following:
– As always, if your child appears ill, please keep them at home with you to really monitor and assess the progression of their illness.
–If your child appears to be exhibiting signs of labored breathing, please keep them home with you (signs of labored breathing can be found in the article linked above). If staff in the center call to alert you that your child’s breathing appears to have changed from baseline and they are feeling unwell, please make your best effort to pick them up within the hour.
–If your child has a cough or cold symptoms, was seen by their provider and was prescribed Albuterol via a nebulizer, regardless of whether or not they were tested for RSV, please keep them home until they have been off the nebulizer for 24 hours and their breathing has returned to baseline. This doesn’t apply to children with Asthma Action Plans as part of a chronic condition.
Staff at LCLA do a great job consulting with each other as well as Jessie and I before making the decision to exclude a child from care. As working parents ourselves, we understand what it does to your day to have to leave work to come pick up a sick child. We will make every effort to avoid doing that.
Thank you for your support,
Becky Ketarkus, Owner/Administrator
Little Chicks Learning Academy
RSV Information
