Hartford HealthCare will increase its COVID-19 testing capacity by 500 percent, to 2,500 tests a day, under a partnership announced April 21 with the State of Connecticut and Quest Diagnostics.
The state, as part of the agreement, is relaxing regulations to broaden the availability of testing beyond hospitals and other healthcare settings in underserved communities. Hartford HealthCare, as it explores additional sites, says it will also add a mobile testing capability.
“Twenty-four hours a day, a clinician can be accessed who will provide a test order,” said Jeffrey A. Flaks, Hartford HealthCare’s CEO, at Gov. Ned Lamont’s daily news briefing. “Or any other clinician order will be honored. We’re making this much more accessible and more timely.”
Patients can receive a test with a referral from their provider or by contacting the 24/7 Hartford HealthCare Clinical Command Center at 860.972.8100 or, toll-free, 833.621.0600.
Hartford HealthCare has been providing a total of 500 tests daily at its five hospital drive-through locations, where a clinician swabs the patient’s nose and throat to collect samples that will be sent for evaluation. It’s expected that number will increase at those locations, while also providing additional testing for healthcare workers, first-responders, corrections officers and workers at skilled-nursing facilities.
One of the goals of the expanded testing? To improve access to care and access to testing for the most vulnerable, traditionally underserved communities.
“We are seeing within the people we have tested,” said Sarah Lewis, vice president of health equity for Hartford HealthCare, “that there is a disproportionate rate of positive cases among African-Americans in Connecticut. So that does trend with the state’s data. We don’t have enough data to comment on other racial groups.”
Gov. Lamont said the state hopes to reach 1.5 million tests by mid-May. The 2,000 additional tests each day will increase by 80 percent the current daily statewide average of 2,600 tests.
“This venture between Quest Labs and Hartford HealthCare is just so important,” he said, “in what it means in our being able to ramp up testing capability and to see who is infected. . . . About 40 percent of the people who are infected don’t even show symptoms. Right now, we’re only able to test people who are showing symptoms.”
Quest Diagnostics, which employs 850 in Connecticut, has agreed to pick up test specimens from Hartford HealthCare locations for processing at its central facilities. The results will be entered in each patient’s electronic medical record. Quest has completed 26,000 tests for the state so far.
“The next step,” said Quest Diagnostics CEO Steve Rusckowski, a Torrington native, “is actually to start to look at the antibodies. People are reading today about the serological tests that we are bringing out to the marketplace. We’ll be ramping up in the next several weeks.”
These blood tests will help determine who in the state has had the coronavirus and will help state officials determine the best time to safely reopen the economy.
Here are Hartford HealthCare’s drive-through testing locations:
Hartford Hospital
Education and Resource Center
560 Hudson Street, Hartford
Hours: Daily, 7 am-7 pm
Backus Hospital
326 Washington St, Norwich
Main parking lot
Hours: Daily, 8 am-4 pm
Charlotte Hungerford Hospital
540 Litchfield Street, Torrington
Adjacent to the outpatient entrance
Hours: Daily, 8 am-4 pm
MidState Medical Center
435 Lewis Ave, Meriden
Across from the main entrance
Hours: Daily, 8 am-4 pm
St. Vincent’s Medical Center
2979 Main Street Bridgeport
Across from the campus
Hours: Daily, 8 am-4 pm
Not feeling well? Call your healthcare provider for guidance and try to avoid going directly to an emergency department or urgent care center, as this could increase the chances of the disease spreading.
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