BATON ROUGE - A health care worker who spent 50 days away from his family in order to keep them safe while he worked through the coronavirus outbreak was able to hold his children again Wednesday.

Though Paul Douzat usually works in the operating room at Baton Rouge General, he's been helping his fellow nurses fight COVID-19 ever since he left home March 25. 

For the past seven weeks, Douzat has been living with his brother. He and his wife, Michelle, came to that decision in order to keep his two young children, Addison and Declan, safe during the pandemic. It was especially important considering his youngest child, Declan, is immunocompromised.

While Douzat was able to visit his family safely from the other side of a window at his home, he's waited nearly two months to be able to hold them again.

With Douzat finally returning to performing surgeries two weeks ago, enough time had passed Wednesday for him to finally see his family up close again.

With a sustained downward trajectory of new cases, Louisiana's current stay-at-home order is set to expire Friday. You can learn more about what will and will not reopen this weekend by clicking here.