Model-based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued COVID-19 risk at long term care facilities
The COVID-19 pandemic severely impacted long-term care facilities resulting in the death of approximately 8% of residents nationwide as of March 2021. As COVID-19 case rates declined and state and county restrictions were lifted in spring 2021, facility managers, local and state health agencies were...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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KeAi Communications Co., Ltd.
2022-09-01
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| Series: | Infectious Disease Modelling |
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| Online Access: | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2468042722000549 |
| _version_ | 1797204830039572480 |
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| author | Bailey K. Fosdick Jude Bayham Jake Dilliott Gregory D. Ebel Nicole Ehrhart |
| author_facet | Bailey K. Fosdick Jude Bayham Jake Dilliott Gregory D. Ebel Nicole Ehrhart |
| author_sort | Bailey K. Fosdick |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The COVID-19 pandemic severely impacted long-term care facilities resulting in the death of approximately 8% of residents nationwide as of March 2021. As COVID-19 case rates declined and state and county restrictions were lifted in spring 2021, facility managers, local and state health agencies were challenged with defining their own policies moving forward to appropriately mitigate disease transmission. The continued emergence of variants of concern and variable vaccine uptake across facilities highlighted the need for a readily available tool that can be employed at the facility-level to determine best practices for mitigation and ensure resident and staff safety. To assist leadership in determining the impact of various infection surveillance and response strategies, we developed an agent-based model and an online dashboard interface that simulates COVID-19 infection within congregate care settings under various mitigation measures. This dashboard quantifies the continued risk for COVID-19 infections within a facility given a designated testing schedule and vaccine requirements. Key findings were that choice of COVID-19 diagnostic (ex. nasal swab qRT-PCR vs rapid antigen) and testing cadence has less impact on attack rate and staff workdays missed than does vaccination rates among staff and residents. Specifically, low vaccine uptake among staff at long-term care facilities puts staff and residents at risk of ongoing COVID-19 outbreaks. Here we present our model and dashboard as an exemplar of a tool for state public health officials and facility directors to gain insights from an infectious disease model that can directly inform policy decisions in the midst of a pandemic. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-12T04:23:44Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-ba269dcf35f6441e9f5f63a1f2d02e0c |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2468-0427 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-24T08:41:27Z |
| publishDate | 2022-09-01 |
| publisher | KeAi Communications Co., Ltd. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Infectious Disease Modelling |
| spelling | doaj.art-ba269dcf35f6441e9f5f63a1f2d02e0c2024-04-16T15:51:05ZengKeAi Communications Co., Ltd.Infectious Disease Modelling2468-04272022-09-0173463472Model-based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued COVID-19 risk at long term care facilitiesBailey K. Fosdick0Jude Bayham1Jake Dilliott2Gregory D. Ebel3Nicole Ehrhart4Department of Statistics, Colorado State University, Ft. Collins, CO, 80523, USA; Corresponding author.Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Colorado State University, Ft. Collins, CO, 80523, USADepartment of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Colorado State University, Ft. Collins, CO, 80523, USAArthropod-Borne and Infectious Diseases Laboratory, Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Pathology, Colorado State University, Ft. Collins, CO, 80526, USAColumbine Health Systems Center for Healthy Aging and Department of Clinical Sciences, Colorado State University, Ft. Collins, CO, 80523, USAThe COVID-19 pandemic severely impacted long-term care facilities resulting in the death of approximately 8% of residents nationwide as of March 2021. As COVID-19 case rates declined and state and county restrictions were lifted in spring 2021, facility managers, local and state health agencies were challenged with defining their own policies moving forward to appropriately mitigate disease transmission. The continued emergence of variants of concern and variable vaccine uptake across facilities highlighted the need for a readily available tool that can be employed at the facility-level to determine best practices for mitigation and ensure resident and staff safety. To assist leadership in determining the impact of various infection surveillance and response strategies, we developed an agent-based model and an online dashboard interface that simulates COVID-19 infection within congregate care settings under various mitigation measures. This dashboard quantifies the continued risk for COVID-19 infections within a facility given a designated testing schedule and vaccine requirements. Key findings were that choice of COVID-19 diagnostic (ex. nasal swab qRT-PCR vs rapid antigen) and testing cadence has less impact on attack rate and staff workdays missed than does vaccination rates among staff and residents. Specifically, low vaccine uptake among staff at long-term care facilities puts staff and residents at risk of ongoing COVID-19 outbreaks. Here we present our model and dashboard as an exemplar of a tool for state public health officials and facility directors to gain insights from an infectious disease model that can directly inform policy decisions in the midst of a pandemic.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2468042722000549Agent-based modelNonpharmaceutical interventionsVaccine uptakeCOVID-19 |
| spellingShingle | Bailey K. Fosdick Jude Bayham Jake Dilliott Gregory D. Ebel Nicole Ehrhart Model-based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued COVID-19 risk at long term care facilities Infectious Disease Modelling Agent-based model Nonpharmaceutical interventions Vaccine uptake COVID-19 |
| title | Model-based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued COVID-19 risk at long term care facilities |
| title_full | Model-based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued COVID-19 risk at long term care facilities |
| title_fullStr | Model-based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued COVID-19 risk at long term care facilities |
| title_full_unstemmed | Model-based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued COVID-19 risk at long term care facilities |
| title_short | Model-based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued COVID-19 risk at long term care facilities |
| title_sort | model based evaluation of policy impacts and the continued covid 19 risk at long term care facilities |
| topic | Agent-based model Nonpharmaceutical interventions Vaccine uptake COVID-19 |
| url | http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2468042722000549 |
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