Employees and residents at Eventide in Moorhead receive COVID-19 vaccine

After the vaccines have been administered, Kollar says it's important to keep an eye out for any issue that may arise.

MOORHEAD, Minn.- Eventide Senior Living Community receives a sense of relief after the arrival of COVID-19 vaccinations.

“I’m very excited to receive the vaccine. I’m excited to see what this brings for our staff, for our residents, for the community and just looking forward to turning the page in the pandemic and improving from here,” Executive Director at Eventide Senior Living Community Emily Kollar said.

The senior care center’s executive director says they received the vaccines a few days earlier, but had to follow protocols before distribution.

“When we first received the vaccines right around Christmas time our nurse leadership team spent time calling all of the families and obtaining consent and they were just ecstatic they said it was the best Christmas present anyone could have given us,” Kollar said.

Prioritizing senior vaccinations was their main concern.

“We’ve received four hundred doses of the Moderna vaccine so well start administering them today. We’ll administer around one hundred resident vaccinations and then we’ll begin with our employee vaccinations as well,” Kollar said.

One of the first employees at the facility to receive the vaccine describes what this means for seniors and employees at Eventide.

“It’s great, just happy, elated everyone is excited it’s long awaited, I’m proud to be a part of this and hopefully moving towards COVID going away and being back to a new normal,” Resident Care Manager at Eventide Jacob Koponen said.

After the vaccines have been administered, Kollar says it’s important to keep an eye out for any issue that may arise.

“We do monitor the recommendations for 15 minutes right after the vaccine and then half an hour if they’ve had a previous experience with a reaction to a vaccine. It’s very important to follow protocols to monitor symptoms just to be able to be sure that your body is reacting well to it,” Kollar said.

Koponen says even if you happen to experience symptoms afterwards it’s okay.

“It’s normal to have maybe a little tiredness. Your temperature might go up for a little bit but that’s just your body’s natural response to building immunity and building antibodies against the virus,” Koponen said.

Residents and staff who received their first round of the Moderna vaccine will have to wait 28 days for their second dosage.