'NABL-accredited city lab offers drive-through test for suspected COVID 19 patients'

An NABL-accredited diagnostic laboratory in the city has come up with an innovative step for testing suspected coronavirus infected persons without having them to queue up before hospitals and coming in contact with anyone, including the paramedical staff collecting the sample.

Named "drive through test", the procedure has been designed by Dr Dangs Lab, a West Delhi-based diagnostic lab and it envisages the suspected patients reaching the laboratory's parking lot in his vehicle with a trained paramedic waiting to collect his sample with the patient sitting in his car and driving back home in just over 10 minutes.

Dr Dangs Lab (DDL), which is a diagnostic lab accredited with National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories, has three centres in the city -- one each in Johr Bagh, Punjabi Bagh and on Aurobondo Marg, besides a fourth one in Gurgaon.

The laboratory has begun to offer the "drive-through" tests from Monday, said DDL's CEO Arjun Dang, adding the test conforms to the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) guidelines.

"The drive-through test is inspired by two factors -- there are countries like South Korea which have conducted the test successfully and it ensures maximum safety for patient and staff," he told PTI.

Explaining about the test, he said one can register for it online by uploading a government ID and the doctor's prescription and will be given a time slot.

The patient will also have to share the vehicle number in which he intends to reach the lab.

Once the patient arrives in the parking lot of the lab, the staff, equipped with all the safety kits, will collect the sample with the patient sitting in his car itself.

All that the suspected patient has to do is to tilt back his head a bit and open his mouth to enable the paramedic to collect the swab sample from his throat and then another one from nose, explained Dang.

This process takes around eight to nine minutes and the patient can give the sample sitting in his car, he said, adding that the patient can drive back in less than 15 minutes.

After collecting the sample from the patient, our staff discards the PPE kit immediately.

"We keep a buffer of 20 minutes between each patient, which allows our staffer time to discard the PPE kit. The laboratory premises is also disinfected on a regular basis," he said.

The test report will be mailed to the patient within 36 hours on the patient's registered email ID, he said.

"There is minimal contact between the staff and the patient. Even the money transaction is online and through cash wallets and every procedure is online and paperless to ensure minimum chances of transmission," he said.