Greetings from all of us here at ILC to all of our friends and colleagues. There is a great cloud over our collective humanity right now. Thus, this is a time to take great care and be humbled in the deepest sense of the Heart and Spirit. Life is calling out to us to pay attention to how we are living individually and collectively. Here at ILC, we’re taking action in the face of COVID-19 to stay safe but still be proactive.
Here in Nashville, we have taken great measures to create safety and awareness as a community. At Integrative Life Center, our charge has been to put protocols and practices in place that will offer security to our clients and staff while maintaining the integrity of our clinical practices and community.
This is a powerful time. But it’s an opportunity to bring attention to our every choice, response, action, and thought. As an essential business, ILC has chosen to remain open to current and new clients with strict protocols that we follow daily. Therefore, we have received a full stock of COVID-19 RNA tests that we are using to test all current and new employees and clients. We currently have no confirmed cases of the coronavirus at Integrative Life Center.
Our Daily Protocols
Our entire staff has made a commitment to live their lives with the highest level of attention to detail and under the Safer at Home guidelines of our greater community. Every day, each employee who is not working from home has their temperature taken upon arrival for their shift. At any indication of an increased temperature or flu-like symptoms, the staff member will be will be given a COVID-19 test. If results are negative, the staff member will be sent home to self-quarantine and recover. If positive, per the Tennessee Department of Health guidelines they will dismissed to isolate at home for 7 days + 72 hours from the time they feel well. Our Director of Compliance will draft an incident report and take the proper steps in reporting the case to the Tennessee Department of Health.
Each new client has their temperature taken and is given an RNA COVID-19 test upon admission. Only once the results show negative is the client cleared to join the residential communities at ILC. An RNA test will show the presence of the virus even prior to symptoms developing so there are very low false negatives.
Client Community Precautions
For clients living in the community at ILC, we take temperatures twice a day, morning and evening. Doing so assures the health and wellness of all is maintained. In the case of a heightened temperature, we administer an RNA COVID-19 test. If the test is positive and the client wishes to stay with ILC while they recover, we transport them to an offsite residence to self-quarantine. Here they’ll have nursing support and the rest of the community will be administered a test. If there are more positives, the house will go into a collective quarantine (with nursing support). Through telehealth capabilities, quarantined clients can still participate in programming if they are well enough.
We have restructured our staffing model. Thus, we’ve reduced the number of staff coming and going while maintaining a full roster at all times. We’re using face-to-face and telehealth group leaders to keep exposure to a minimum. Yet, our staff and clients have access to a full and diverse program experience. The clients still visit Pinewood Farms for equine, Medicine Wheel, and other healthy outings, experiential groups, and ceremonies.
Our Healing Foods program has been expanded beyond our Residential clients to those participating in our PHP programming to reduce grocery store runs. Catered by Pinewood Kitchen & Mercantile and directed by Chef Mee Mccormick along with our Director of Nutrition Services, Mackenzie Reeser, the Healing Foods meals are designed to support autoimmune strength and wellness. Also, they’re absolutely delicious.
Taking Action in the Face of COVID-19
We have taken every precaution to ensure that the ILC client communities and staff have as little (or no) exposure to the outside world. We do this following the directives of government-mandated physical distancing period. ILC is as safe as a community could possibly be in light of the public health crisis we are facing. We’ve designed our strict protocols to prioritize the health of everyone. But we remain dedicated to maintaining our deep, soulful clinical work and diversity of programming. We may not all be under the same roof at this time. Yet we’re all under the same Integrative Life Center banner. We’re in this together.
So if we can be of service to your clients please give us a call. Any questions at all are welcome.
Lee McCormick
Co-Founder
Integrative Life Center
