photo by: Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health

A health care worker in LMH Health’s skilled nursing unit has tested positive for COVID-19, the local hospital announced Friday afternoon.

LMH Health will be testing all employees and patients in the skilled nursing unit, the hospital said in a news release. Since the employee wore personal protective equipment while working, the hospital said it expects the risk to patients to be “minimal.”

LMH Health said it would be notifying all patients and families who may have been exposed. The affected employee contracted COVID-19 outside the LMH Health facility, the hospital said.

Douglas County has reported 494 cases of COVID-19 as of Friday, an increase of five cases since Thursday.

In Douglas County, 357 out of the 494 cases are inactive or beyond the infectious period, according to Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health.

Five patients at Lawrence’s hospital had COVID-19 on Friday, two fewer than Thursday.

According to the Douglas County Community Scorecard, there were three outbreaks in Douglas County this past week. An outbreak is defined as two or more cases not from the same household with the same identified source of exposure. The scorecard also notes that 26 cases from this past week were due to community transmission: that is, the cases could not be linked to a known case, an outbreak or travel.

The Kansas Department of Health and Environment’s online map noted that 9,384 Douglas County residents had been tested for the disease so far. The county’s testing rate per 1,000 people was 76.8.