As Pennsylvania’s public health chief warns of a second wave of covid-19 community spread, nursing homes are bracing for a potential correlative wave of nursing home outbreaks and deaths.

About a quarter of Pennsylvania’s nearly 700 nursing homes reported not having enough personal protective equipment during September, according to an analysis of federal data released last week by senior advocacy group AARP.

“We are definitely keeping an eye on our long-term care facilities and our nursing homes,” said Dr.

“As we’ve seen in the past, the cases in nursing homes tend to trail behind the cases we see in communities.

So if we see a rise in community cases, a couple weeks later, we’ll see a rise in nursing home cases.”.

With about 66 deaths per 1,000 residents, Pennsylvania’s nursing home death rate ranks eighth in the nation.

After months of reporting zero cases, an outbreak at Allegheny County’s Kane Community Living Center in Scott has climbed to 150 cases among residents and staff and 13 resident deaths.

At places where most residents havecontracted and recovered from covid-19, risks remain for staff and new admissions, and asymptomatic carriers who work at nursing homes can pose a risk to their families and other people outside their workplaces.

Presbyterian SeniorCare Network — which runs facilities in 10 counties, including long-term care facilities in Oakmont and Washington — has reported 33 covid-19 cases out of nearly 600 residents, according to state data.

Across the United States, more than 28,000 nursing home residents tested positive for covid-19 and 5,200 died between late August and September, “showing the virus is still raging in nursing homes,” says the report produced by AARP with the Scripps Center at Miami University in Ohio.

“While the pandemic has been unexpected to all of us, basic infection control should have been going on in nursing homes for a long time.

Bogen said the creation of a state task force charged with monitoring nursing homes has helped the facilities become better prepared than they were in the spring.

The state doled out $175 million to several groups to assist long-term care facilities in various parts of the state by procuring supplies, assessing infection control programs and offering in-person and virtual consultations and a 24/7 hotline for nursing home operators seeking guidance.

Program member Emily Jaffe, a geriatrician and Allegheny Health Network’s medical director of post-acute care and HM Home and Community Services, described the regional team as “the best health care collaboration that I’ve seen in my career.”.

“The nursing home industry is taking a pretty hard hit right now.