Drive-thru screening for COVID-19 Brought to Little Rock Neighborhood
| As the late morning sun dried out the rainwashed pavement May 23 at Saint Mark Baptist Church in Little Rock, UAMS Chancellor Cam Patterson, M.D., MBA, and Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott greeted Gov. Asa Hutchinson as he arrived to visit with members of the UAMS Triage Unit’s mobile team.
The team conducted drive-thru evaluations to assess whether city residents might have COVID-19. A total of 58 patients were screened and 27 of those were tested. No one tested positive.
Little Rock Mayor Frank Scott, center, greets and elbow bumps one of the medical volunteers at the Saint Mark drive-thru.Image by Bryan Clifton
Speaking to the mobile team and about a dozen volunteers from Saint Mark, Hutchinson recounted a pool party of high school students elsewhere in Arkansas that resulted in some community spread of the disease.
“Hearing those kind of anecdotes makes you realize why we wear masks and try to protect each other,” Hutchinson said. “More than ever, we have got to continue life. I think we all recognize that. At the same time, we have to be able to manage this virus to the extent we can. You all are making that possible with this drive-thru clinic.”
From early April through mid-May, the triage team screened more than 1,500 people and tested almost 900 of those who participated in the drive-thru clinics in a dozen Arkansas cities.
“We’ve been to southwest Little Rock, Forrest City, Marianna, Texarkana and many other cities across the state,” Patterson said. “We want to make sure we cover as much turf as we can. We go where we are welcome to go, and we go to areas where we have concerns. We take care of 3 million Arkansans. We don’t want a single one to fall through the cracks.”
At the drive-thru entrances in each city, residents are seen by one of the nurses then drive into the service areas in front of public buildings to be asked a series of screening questions by one of the UAMS physicians on site. Their condition and answers determined if they need testing. The swabs are performed by experienced nurses and medics from the National Guard who obtain a specimen from the back part of the nose.
Two volunteers at the drive-thru ask a patient COVID-19 screening questions.Image by Bryan Clifton
The samples are taken back to UAMS for processing and follow-up with the patients with their results in a couple of days. No patient had to get out of their vehicle, and all the screeners were wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) such as masks, eye protection, gloves and disposable medical gowns.
Jennifer Hunt, M.D., is director of the UAMS Triage Unit and chair of the UAMS College of Medicine Department of Pathology and Laboratory Sciences.
“It’s important to go beyond the UAMS campus and be out in the community,” Hunt said. “Some people can’t easily get to the hospital and some may just not want to go there. At the drive-thru clinics people from the community come with their friends and relatives to be screened. We are able to reach a lot more people when we take the mobile unit on the road”
Glenn Hersey, Saint Mark outreach pastor, said the church was happy to host the clinic and provide volunteer support to the event.
Sponsors of the event were the City of Little Rock, St. Mark, the Minority Health Commission, Arkansas Children’s and the Mexican Consulate.