Serving O'Brien & Clay Counties
Serving O'Brien & Clay Counties
Rapid result COVID-19 testing strips hard to come by for nursing homes
Community Memorial Health Center Director of Nursing Susie Stanley swabs the nose of C.N.A. Pierce Van Sloten during a COVID-19 test this week. The Hartley facility is having a hard time finding more rapid testing strips to adhere to federal testing rules.
A shortage of COVID-19 testing material has officials at Community Memorial Health Center worried the facility will soon fall out of compliance with federal guidelines.
CMHC recently received a rapid coronavirus-testing machine from the federal government to quickly test staff and monitor potential infections. However, since O'Brien County's COVID-19 positivity rate is more than 10 percent of those tested, staff must be scanned once a week with a 48-hour turnaround for results. CMHC's original bundle of 240 rapid testing strips quickly depleted, and the facility was slated to run out this week...
