Gateshead's QE puts a restriction on hospital visitors to curb Covid-19

Visiting restrictions have come into force at a Gateshead hospital in a bid to clamp down on the spread of coronavirus.

Visiting at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Gateshead is being temporarily limited to certain groups due to the spread of the Omicron variant of Covid-19 in the local community.

This means visiting is now limited to patients who are receiving end-of-life care, birthing partners in maternity units, parents or legal guardians of children and mental health patients.

Nicola Bruce, director of operations at the hospital, said that the measures have been put in place because of the Omicron variant of the virus.

She said:

“The Omicron variant of Covid-19 is now spreading rapidly in the local community and whilst we have been trying to maintain some visiting because we realise how important this is to patients and relatives, unfortunately, the increase in cases does now pose a greater risk of our patients acquiring the virus.

“A proportion of people with Omicron appear to have no symptoms and regrettably, as a result, we have seen some transmission in our hospitals which has been linked to visiting.

"We have to put the protection of our patients, some of whom are vulnerable or immuno-compromised, as our first priority and so we have taken the difficult decision to temporarily stop all visiting unless there are exceptional circumstances.

“We will continue to monitor the situation with a view to reinstating visiting as soon as we can do so safely.”

Those who can’t visit under the new rules can keep in touch with people staying in hospital with electronic ‘virtual visiting’, bedside telephone calls, or by sending messages to loved ones (ghnt.messagetoalovedone@nhs.net / 0191 445 6047 or 0191 445 6129 between 10am and 12pm, Monday to Friday).