CINCINNATI — The University of Cincinnati Medical Center can now perform some in-house testing for the novel coronavirus, reducing the time patients wait for results to as little as a day.
It’s not as fast as the Ohio Department of Health’s central lab, which ODH director Amy Acton said can process tests in as little as eight hours, but it’s much faster than the seven-day wait times associated with some private labs.
Testing will initially be limited to inpatients at UC Health hospitals and must be ordered by a patient’s doctor, according to a news release from UC Health.
UC physicians will use a modified version of the procedure developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, taking nasopharyngeal swabs and processing them in one to three days.
”Expedited access to results also allows us to conserve our personal protective equipment by allowing us to use these resources when people truly need it,” Dr. George Smulian said in a news release.
