Tennessee: The Children’s Health Fund (CHF) supported mobile program is part of a large collaboration between the City and County Government, the University of Tennessee, and multiple Federally Qualified Health Centers. Expanding access to testing for anyone who wants it has been a priority and great strides were made this past week as the CHF Memphis Mobile Clinic began deployment to underserved communities around the city. Among the sites being visited now are local Walgreens and Krogers. The Memphis program has recently gained in-house capacity for rapid test results, and are now testing children, as well as adults.
Puerto Rico: Unfortunately, Puerto Rico remains in dire need of personal protective equipment as shipments aren’t getting through. CHF is sending N95 masks to them this week.
Clarksdale, MS: just south of Memphis along the Mississippi Delta, the CHF mobile clinic is also going out to under-resourced communities and doing community outreach to open access to those who don’t have transportation or resources to go to the clinic sites. The lack of PPE and test kits had hampered scale, but in the last two weeks the Mississippi program provided more than 400 tests with 48 hour determination of results.
Los Angeles: CHF LA partner provided COVID-19 prevention education at various Watts/South LA drive-thru testing sites and walk-up community food distribution locations (schools, churches, civic center, etc.) thus far reaching more than 16,000 individuals. The program worked with Healthcare for the Homeless Programs, to create pop-up clinics at emergency shelters to provide medical and case management services.
Baton Rouge: Multiple versions of the test for COVID-19 have become available, paving the way for faster results. This increased availability allowed for opening of a new testing site and broader community reach in testing capacity.
Dallas: Dallas continues to set the standards for testing capacity and innovation! Drive by testing sites include the mobile clinic parking lot (the only site a car is not required), American Airlines Center, and the Ellis David Fieldhouse – in total 5 mobile clinics are being used for testing. Parkland has started testing at skilled nursing facilities this week as well. Testing protocols include first responders; healthcare workers; essential employees; people over 65 yrs; people with chronic health conditions; people with fever, cough and shortness of breath.
Houston: The CHF partner in Houston has integrated new technology for temperature reading that has improved the efficiency of COVID-19 employee and patient screening processes. Ten thermal imaging cameras are now being used at employee, patient, and visitor screening locations. The new cameras measure temperature on the skin’s surface using infrared light to generate a thermal image and temperature reading in a fast, non-invasive, and precise method. They also allow more people to be screened in a shorter amount of time while maintaining social distancing.
New Orleans: Targeted advertising has increased testing in hard to reach communities of color but testing is still limited to those with symptoms. The team is working with the state and local health department officials to receive more tests and expand the criteria.
New York: The New York Program was able to deliver hundreds of cloth masks to a family shelter that houses over 300 families. Additional masks will be given to patients, staff, and other homeless shelters. In addition, their mobile clinic is being used to collect plasma from COVID-19 survivors to help further treatment research.
The Healthy and Ready to Learn Online Resource and Training Center has updated materials for the community, school staff, and families. A weekly webinar plus two mindfulness breaks are hosted each week. This week scores of gift cards for needy families were distributed. https://hrl.nyc/
Southern Arizona: The team held its first drive-thru COVID-19 testing on Saturday, May 9. A lack of testing supplies and personal protective equipment was responsible for the delay. Revenue is down and many employees have been furloughed.
Miami (South Florida): Our program in Miami convinced County officials to lower the minimum testing age to 12 years old. They plan to work for the Florida Department of Health to do contact tracing for the state testing sites.
Trenton: The Trenton team has moved into the four wards of the City to offer screening and testing for hard to reach communities. They also coordinated a COVID-19 step down unit and are leaders in offering telemedicine, telemental health, and telntistry ieden response to the pandemic.
Washington, DC: CHF’s DC partner was the first facility to establish a “kids only” COVID-19 mobile testing site that travels to some area’s most resource-limited communities. Now, their partner institution is able to run the tests, which will allow for faster results.