How many sites offer COVID testing in Hamilton county?

“In Hamilton County, right now, there are nine sites that are doing COVID testing. Four of them are CVS Pharmacies. There’s also the Fishers Health Department. Then, there’s the Hamilton County Community Testing Site; there’s two of those. There’s one at Aspire. There’s also an Optum test site at Ivy Tech Noblesville. And there’s us (at Trinity Free Clinic).”

How does the testing process work from there at Trinity Free Clinic?

“Everyone registers online. It’s really preferred that they register online before they come, but they can walk in and we can try to get (them) on to the schedule. And after we go through the online registration process, (they) actually will go to the test room and what we do is they take a swab; it will either be a shorter swab that we (call) a lower nasal test or it will be a longer swab (that) is called a nasopharyngeal test. (Nasopharyngeal tests) go much deeper into the sinuses and they’re pretty uncomfortable. And the whole process from when you walk in the door, if you’re already registered online, is like two minutes.

How long have you been offering COVID testing?

“We started on September 30. Obviously, it’s a new service that is being offered through our organization. And we have still continued to offer the same services that we always have, (which is) free medical, dental, and vision care for Hamilton County families”

What was it like for you to set up this new service?

“So we’re really fortunate in that the COVID testing is really being footed by local government and state government. Since we have a medical facility already, what we actually did was we partitioned off our waiting room. One side, we’re still keeping available for our pa

tients that come in for their medical, dental, and vision appointments and then the other side, we convert into COVID testing. There isn’t a lot of supplies that you really need to do the testing and all of those are supplied to us by the state.”

Why did you start COVID testing?

“(At Trinity Free Clinic), we really focus on underprivileged families in our county. So when we (saw) more and more people losing their jobs and more and more patients coming through our door in desperate need. So it made sense to expand our services to include doing COVID testing, partially because a lot of our patients feel very self-conscious about needing care. So to be able to go someplace that is very familiar to them really made sense as (an) extension of the care that we’re already giving folks.”

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Chenyao Liu

The CVS on 367 W. 116th St. is now performing drive-up COVID-19 testing. To qualify for testing, patients must fill out a questionnaire and registration form while also providing an insurance card and proof of identity. The test is self-administered and results are typically received in 2 to 3 days.

Click  here to see Trinity Free Clinic’s COVID-19 resources.