ALWAYS HERE TO SERVE YOU – WORKING HARD TO KEEP YOU SAFE

As we have throughout the current health crisis, we remain available to serve you. Our team is hard at work striving to serve the community’s needs by providing our services in a manner that is compassionate and meaningful while following closely the guidance of health authorities to protect our customers, our community and our team.

Following the declaration of a state of emergency by the Province of New Brunswick in March, we closed our facilities to public access. While restrictions have now been relaxed, we are still operating with some limitations on traffic in our buildings.  Whether making arrangements, visiting family members or attending a service we must ask your cooperation to ensure that all safety protocols are followed.

We continue to ask that those coming to meet with us call for an appointment in advance. If you are considering attending a visitation or service please check the published obituary or contact us by telephone to ensure that the gathering is ‘open’. Some families are still choosing by-invitation-only events out of concern for everyone’s well-being.

If you do come to the funeral home, please be prepared to undergo the mandatory COVID-19 screening process. In addition, as required by provincial regulation, we will be collecting contact information from all visitors to be shared (only) with health authorities for contact tracing purposes, should the need occur.

As always, if you are feeling unwell, having flu-like symptoms, or running a fever, or if you have travelled outside of the Atlantic Provinces recently and not yet completed your required 14 days of isolation, please do not leave home. We are requiring the same of our staff.

LARGER GATHERINGS

With recent changes in regulations, we are now able to hold larger gatherings  in locations where physical distancing can be maintained. This applies to visitations, funeral services and burials, at our funeral homes, in Churches and at cemeteries. Each venue and each room will have its own specified capacity which cannot be exceeded. 

Each family we serve will be advised of the guest capacity for their gathering and, where necessary, asked to help determine who should be in attendance and to communicate the necessary information to those people. It certain circumstances we continue to recommend against publicly releasing service times to avoid over-crowding.

Physical distancing is a vital part of ensuring we can safely continue to gather for services. To help ensure that everyone remains safe and that further outbreaks don’t cause a return to tighter restrictions, we will be carefully following public health guidelines at all services and asking the community to work with us to help implement this successfully. 

If you are attending a funeral-related gathering, you can expect to receive direction, upon arriving at the service location, relating to safely entering and leaving the venue. Once inside, we will be suggesting that guests sit only with those in their own household and maintain a two-metre distance from all others, at all times. 

Physical contact - hugs and handshakes – continues to be discouraged. Standard precautions with regard to handwashing and not touching your face are recommended and, in keeping with provincial regulation, community face masks are required.

OPTIONS TO SUIT YOUR NEEDS AND COMFORT LEVEL

At this time, we are meeting family representatives in person to make funeral arrangements, under strictly applied safety guidelines, however, we are able to conduct complete arrangements by telephone where that is preferred. Once again, we are asking that you always call to make an appointment before coming to the funeral home.

Whether by phone or in person, our funeral directors are well prepared to guide families through the options available to address their needs in these difficult circumstances. We can arrange gatherings as described above but continue to offer webcast services for others to attend virtually. Your funeral director will be happy to help you determine what will work best for you.

Our preplanning staff also remain available, by telephone, to assist you. They can answer any questions you may have about existing or new prearrangements. Contact them through the funeral homes.

YOU CAN HELP

While suffering a loss is never easy, it has become particularly difficult under the circumstances we currently find ourselves in. Being unable to come together at such a time, to offer comfort and care to one another, adds significantly to the burden of grief.

Even with the relaxed restrictions we are now experiencing, we still are not able to do all the things we normally do to support those in grief – surrounding them with the love and compassion of their entire community.

So, we’re asking each of you to be mindful of those you know who may have suffered a loss. Please reach out with a card or a call, use the funeral home website to send a message of condolence or pledge a memorial donation, send flowers to the family home or drop off a meal. Find a way to offer comfort from a safe distance and remind them that they are not alone in their grief and that the loss of their loved one has not gone unnoticed. Your thoughtfulness is needed now more than ever.

 

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Finally, please remember that while things are slowly returning to normal, this is only possible as long as we follow the rules that are keeping us all safe and stopping the spread of the virus. If we fail in this effort, we will be forced to return to stricter guidelines that will limit us once again in our ability to care for one another at times of loss.

We are grateful to everyone for their understanding as we continue to address this situation and seek the best ways to protect everyone while serving those in need. If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us by phone (McAdam’s 458-9170 / Oromocto 357-5100) or email: McAdams@McAdamsFH.com

 

THANK YOU