(KLFY)- Family and friends are reunited at Eunice Manor as Louisiana loosens COVID-19 restrictions for nursing homes visits.

Administrator Nicki Toups says, “We still have to be safe, still be mindful. There is still COVID out there.”

The doors are safely open after a year on lockdown and seven months without visitors.

“It wasn’t easy. Residents stayed in their rooms. There was depression and sadness. We had to get creative,” explains Toups.

Friday, Louisiana eased restrictions for indoor visitation at nursing homes.

Toups says this allowed for the facility and her staff to safely and with protocols in place, ease their indoor activities’ restrictions as well.

“The excitement is unbelievable. They can come out for bingo. People are coming out of their rooms, rolling in their wheelchairs,” Toups adds.

She says the last year has showed the resilience of her residents and staff.

She explains when visitation lockdown was announced, family members took it the hardest.

Toups continues, “We had family members that visited daily, on their lunch hours or after work. So for me to say, you can’t visit, that was hard for everyone.”

Although the news of visitation is relieving, Toups says, there comes a fear with allowing the outside in.

She says the “what ifs” continue to linger.

Toups adds, “As an adminstror, I have lots of fears. People don’t realize what it entails if there is COVID inside a hospital or a nursing home.”

Some expectations to the state’s new guidelines include:

–Parishes where the positivity rate is greater than 10% and less than 70% of residents in the facility are fully vaccinated.

-Residents with confirmed COVID infections, whether vaccinated or unvaccinated, until after the isolation period.

-Residents in quarantine because they have been exposed to a positive case, whether vaccinated or unvaccinated, until they have met the criteria for release from quarantine.

For the complete set of revised guidelines, click here.