Family of long-term care resident with COVID-19 were outside glass enclosure as she died. Now they urge change

Shirley May Clouter moved into a long-term care facility in Guelph, Ont., on Dec. 10, 2021, and one month later, the 95-year-old died after contracting COVID-19.

Her granddaughter, Vanessa Lodge, said family members stood outside a glass enclosure just steps away, but still apart, from Clouter in her final moments at Guelph General Hospital on Jan. 9.

"This, honestly, was our biggest fear … my mom, my sisters and I, it was grandma going into the home and dying from COVID. And she did," Lodge said.

Now, along with the grief, the close-knit family has many questions about what happened.

Lodge said her grandmother didn't have her third dose of the COVID-19 vaccine when she moved into LaPointe Fisher Nursing Home, but the family was told by staff that it was OK, and they'd get her the booster shot.

But that never happened.

When Clouter started to feel unwell on Jan. 4, she was given a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) COVID-19 test. The results came back Jan. 8 and confirmed she had COVID-19, Lodge said. That same day, Clouter was taken to Guelph General Hospital, where she died a day later.

Lodge questions why no one at the home told them they were having trouble securing a third dose for her grandmother.

"My mom worked in the health-care system for almost her whole career. She would have just called up her doctor and gotten her one," Lodge said.

WATCH | Vanessa Lodge recalls fond memories of her grandmother:

The outbreak at the 92-bed facility where Clouter lived was declared on Jan. 3. As of Wednesday, there were 20 cases in people who lived at the home, 30 cases in staff members and two deaths linked to the outbreak.

In an emailed statement to CBC Kitchener-Waterloo, Shane Outridge, director of quality improvement at LaPoint Fisher, said the facility works closely with public health to "ensure initial doses and booster doses of the COVID-19 vaccine are administered as soon as possible to our staff and residents after becoming eligible."

Outridge said 100 per cent of staff at the facility have had two doses of the vaccine, while a majority have received a third dose.

"Among residents, we are happy to report the majority have now received their fourth dose," Outridge wrote.