Name: Bay Area coronavirus testing delays persist. Who’s to blame?
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Bay Area coronavirus testing delays persist. Who’s to blame?

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This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigateA growing number of citizens and health care officials are accusing Bay Area hospitals and medical centers of failing to provide timely coronavirus testing during the nation’s largest uptick in COVID-19 cases since the pandemic began almost a year ago.Long wait times have been reported at major health care providers like Kaiser Permanente and Sutter Health as the disease spreads wildly and California counties take drastic action to halt surging case loads.It can take five or more days to get an appointment for a coronavirus test at the hospitals and two to five days to get back the results, according to numerous people who have tried to make appointments and inquiries at Kaiser Permanente. It’s a time frame that epidemiologists and public health officials say is unacceptable during a crisis.“In order for testing to be useful, from a clinical standpoint or from a public health standpoint, it needs to be fast, economical, accessible and accurate,” said Robert Siegel, an infectious-disease specialist at Stanford University, noting that infected people who don’t isolate themselves immediately often spread the disease. “There is a critical need for speed both in terms of getting the test, as well as getting the results. Importantly, the barrier for getting a test needs to be low enough that no infected individuals do get overlooked.”The delays are particularly troubling because the complaints are not new, according to patients, many of whom have posted their concerns about long wait times on Twitter. Public health officials have been urging the major hospital systems to increase testing and speed up the process for months.Stanford peeps still in the area, anyone having issues booking a COVID test? I can't book something for ~2 weeks which makes the weekly testing requirement impossible -- any suggestions?— Samson Mataraso (@SamsonMataraso)It was such a concern in September that Santa Clara County health officials enacted fines of up to $5,000 per violation for private health care providers that did not make coronavirus testing accessible and fast enough for their patients.Since then, the county has issued fines totaling $3,750 to Kaiser’s San Jose Medical Center and $8,250 to Sutter Health’s Palo Alto Medical Foundation. The county also fined HCA Healthcare’s San Jose properties Good Samaritan Hospital and Regional Medical Center $8,500 and $22,750, respectively. Santa Clara is the only county in the Bay Area to enact fines.Despite the threat of fines, private medical centers are still way behind. The Santa Clara public health system conducted an average of 4,235 tests a day last week. Kaiser’s seven-day average was 1,927 daily tests, and Stanford Hospital’s was 1,078 tests. Sutter hospitals averaged only 418 daily tests in that time, according to the county health department website. Turnaround time averages a little over two days.It is especially upsetting to public health officials because many of those who are unwilling or unable to wait are bypassing their own insurance providers and getting tests at free testing facilities funded by taxpayers.This phenomenon has caused delays at San Francisco’s free coronavirus testing services, known as the CityTestSF program. An average of 8,700 people a day were tested over the past week in San Francisco, more than any other city per capita in the nation, officials said. That includes about 6,500 daily tests at the 27 free, mobile sites spread around the city.V impressed with the turnaround on ’s covid test results (testing at 10:30 this morning; negative result came in 10 mins ago). NOT impressed that this was the first available appt that I could schedule after a relative tested positive 15 days ago.— GC (@Grregslist)Caroline Savello, the chief commercial officer for Color, the health technology company that conducts the testing for the San Francisco Department of Public Health, said it has been a burden, but she said she can understand why people would turn to them.“If you are feeling sick now or had exposure, waiting for five days is not ideal,” Savello said, adding that it is particularly true when the virus is spreading as fast as it is now. “If you are feeling symptoms, getting tested sooner is critical. That’s obviously really important in terms of preventing transmission.”Some improvements were made after public health officials in the nine Bay Area counties began badgering private health care providers to step up and do their share of testing.Kaiser officials said major investments have been made in laboratory facilities and equipment. Kaiser hospitals in Northern California are now capable of doing 20,000 COVID-19 tests a day, according to a company statement. Kaiser also reimburses patients who are tested at private labs or independent facilities set up at CVS, Walgreens, Walmart and other retail locations.“Everyone, including Kaiser Permanente, agrees more testing needs to be done throughout our communities to address the pandemic and we are committed to making testing timely and accessible for our members,” the Kaiser statement said.More for youKaiser, which has 4.4 million members in Northern California, said it takes an average of one to three days to get an appointment and another one to three days to get the results, but that doesn’t square with what a Kaiser advice nurse and its website, kp.org, revealed this week.The earliest appointment at Kaiser San Rafael, in Marin County, and at the city’s Mission Bay facility was five days away, a check of the website on Monday revealed. It was a six-day wait for a test at the Geary Boulevard campus. An advice nurse said test results usually come back in two to five days, not one to three days.The statewide turnaround time averages just over 24 hours. In San Francisco, 86% of test results at the free sites are returned in less than 24 hours and 99% in less than 48 hours, Savello said.Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Area’s largest water districts.Sutter Health says it has made a concerted effort to increase testing of patients and health care workers. It now performs an average of 3,200 COVID-19 tests daily at its hospitals and care facilities across Northern California, with results coming back between 24 and 48 hours, on average. The hospital chain is planning to make home test kits available.The problem, Sutter officials said, is high demand. Testing statewide is up at least 20% compared with a month ago and 46% compared with two months ago. Wait times for appointments are expected to get even longer as the Christmas holiday approaches.“As COVID-19 cases increase, the demand for testing supplies heightens and potentially creates scarcity concerns for healthcare organizations, and extends turnaround times,” hospital spokeswoman Monique Binkley Smith said in a statement. “The need to develop more diverse testing options is critical, and creating greater access and supporting research that examines these options becomes all the more important.”UCSF announced Tuesday a series of efforts to handle the problem. The university signed a contract with Color to expand free COVID-19 testing for employees and students who have recently traveled or experienced a high-risk exposure. It also plans to distribute nasal swab test kits that can be self administered.The university expects to conduct 1,000 tests a week at UCSF’s San Francisco and Fresno campuses and UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital, in Oakland. It will also begin a random testing program for asymptomatic individuals.“While we await a vaccine, we need fast, accurate COVID-19 testing to continue our essential work caring for patients, educating students and trainees, and conducting research to combat the spread of the virus,” said Ralph Gonzales, associate dean for clinical innovation and chief innovation officer for UCSF Health.The general consensus, though, is that these efforts are not enough. Long wait times for testing have been reported recently at both private and public sites, including the Embarcadero free clinic, which conducts an average of 1,700 tests a day at taxpayer expense.The primary complaint in the city has been that uninsured San Franciscans, essential workers and people who may have been exposed to the virus, are having difficulty getting tested because of the increase at the free sites in customers who have insurance elsewhere.Savello said Color has been doing 20% to 100% more processing of results than the stated capacity at the testing sites. If her company can do it, she said, then the large hospital chains where most people are insured should be able to do it, too.“The pandemic has exposed how we should think differently about health care delivery. It’s not built for true population health, particularly something like a global pandemic,” Savello said. “You should be able to have any church, any school, any clinic be able to collect samples and route them to a laboratory.”Peter Fimrite is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: Twitter:Updated to include drought zones while tracking water shortage status of your area, plus reservoir levels and a list of restrictions for the Bay Area’s largest water districts.

This is a carousel. Use Next and Previous buttons to navigateA growing number of citizens and health care officials are accusing Bay Area hospitals and medical centers of failing to provide timely coronavirus testing during the nation’s largest uptick in COVID-19 cases since the pandemic began almost a year ago.Long wait times have been reported at major health care providers like Kaiser Permanente and Sutter Health as the disease spreads wildly and California counties take drastic action to halt surging case loads.It can take five or more days to get an appointment for a coronavirus test...

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Bay Area coronavirus testing delays persist. Who’s to blame?

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