Medical Scribe-Led, Drive-Through, COVID Test-Only Lanes

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The COVID19 Pandemic accelerated the development of alternative ways of providing care in addition to patients going inside brick-and-mortar locations. We present the development and implementation of a medical scribe-led outdoor, drive-through COVID test-only lane. These lanes are conveniently located adjacent to our health centers, open 2-4 hours per day and have the capacity to serve patients within 5 mins of arrival and without requiring them to leave their cars. During the omicron surge, our lanes were serving 80-100 patients per day. We will present lane setup, workflow, staffing ratios, tasks before, during, and after the test, and demographics of patients served. To fulfill funding requirements, we removed identification, financial barriers, and scheduling barriers. Patients can come and get tested without proof of ID, insurance, or appointment. Initial data analysis suggest that our lanes served a significant number of uninsured patients from historically marginalized groups.

Author(s):

  • JanLee Santos, MD, MHA, Director of Research and Professional Development, Piedmont Health Services