Dixwell Clinic Starts Testing

James Ratliff pulled his bright blue surgical mask back over his face as he left the Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center on Dixwell Avenue — two minutes after he had arrived, and one minute after a nurse had stuck a long nasopharyngeal swab up his nose for 15 seconds.

His coronavirus test was done. He’d find out the results in a few days. Now he had to get back to work changing tires.

Ratliff, 68, was one of 11 patients to come by Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center’s newly opened walk-up testing site at 226 Dixwell Ave. Thursday.

He said that he learned about the existence of the new testing site through his boss, who told him and other colleagues at the auto body shop he works at that they had to get tested for the virus in order to continue coming to work.

“It went well,” Ratliff said about the 15-second swabbing. He said it didn’t hurt, and wasn’t even uncomfortable.

“I came by because I got to get back to work, and my boss wanted me to come in and get this here done,” he said. Ratliff, who lives in Fair Haven, took the bus to Dixwell to visit the testing site.

When asked how he felt taking public transportation to the new testing site, Ratliff said he felt just fine. ​“There was nobody really on the bus.”

He said he hasn’t experienced any Covid-19 symptoms so far.

Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center opened the swabbing station and coronavirus testing site at the heart of Dixwell on Wednesday in a collaborative effort with city government to increase testing options in dense, walkable, working-class communities of color where Covid-19 has caused the most infections, hospitalizations, and fatalities to date. 

Fair Haven Community Health Care also opened a walk-up testing site Wednesday at its headquarters at 374 Grand Ave.

“Corona is a virus. It’s not AIDS, but it might as well be AIDS for people in the community,” Dixwell Alder Jeanette Morrison said during a Thursday afternoon visit to the Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center testing site with Dixwell/Prospect Hill/Newhallville Alder Steve Winter, Hill Health CEO Michael Taylor, Hill Health Chief of Medicine Douglas Bruce, and a handful of other doctors and nurses who work at teh Dixwell site.

She said that she has spoken with Dixwell residents who have been reluctant to leave their homes and try to get tested at one of the existing sites on Long Wharf both because of the inconvenience of setting up an appointment and getting to those locations, and because of a feared stigma around having the virus.

“There’s a trust factor that you simply can’t replace, especially when you’re feeling fearful or vulnerable,” Taylor (pictured) said about the importance of a community health clinic like Hill Health operating a walk-up testing site, instead of the drive-through sites on Long Wharf run by CVS and Yale New Haven Health.

The coronavirus tests are free for patients to receive, regardless of whether or not they have insurance.

Bruce said that patients are strongly encouraged to call ahead to schedule an appointment to be tested, though they are accepting walk-ins who don’t have appointments as well. Cornell Scott-Hill Health’s phone number is 203 – 503-3000.

“The big goal is really to be able to have patients who don’t have cars, who can’t drive to the Long Wharf sites, to just be able to walk in here and get tested,” he said.

The Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center swabbing station and testing site on Dixwell Avenue came together quickly.

Morrison said she called Taylor last week on Wednesday soon after she learned that Dixwell had become one of the local epicenters of the virus based on data reported by the city and the state.

Taylor said that the main hurdle Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center faced in setting up a testing site was the availability of nasopharyngeal swabs and personal protective equipment (PPE) like gowns and gloves.

Why can’t the city just front the money for swabs now and then seek reimbursement from the federal government later? Morrison recalled asking Mayor Justin Elicker in a call last Thursday as plans for the Hill Health testing site were coming together.

She said Elicker, and then Taylor, responded that money wasn’t necessarily the problem in regards to availability of swabs. Rather, the problem was simply getting access to the right materials because of a tight medical supply chain.

Bruce (pictured) said that the breakthrough for the Dixwell site came late last week, when his days and days of pestering Quest Diagnostics paid off with a shipment of a large bolus of swabs. The city Health Department provided extra gowns for the site to use. He and his medical staff put together the rest of the site in a matter of hours, and opened on Wednesday.

“I get nervous about being overwhelmed by the sheer volume,” Taylor said in anticipation of a surge of interest in testing.

He said the big question right now is how Hill Health will be able to keep up with an adequate supply of swabs and other PPE.

Bruce said he’s in talks with Quest Diagnostics on a daily basis about getting access to more material. The city Health Department has promised to help out any way that it can.

So far, Taylor and Bruce said, Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center has been swamped with phone calls by patients interested in scheduling appointments. But not yet in terms of tests administered.

Bruce said the site conducted 10 tests Thursday morning. Ratliff was the 11th; the center had two more patients scheduled for the day. He said the site did not test anyone on Wednesday, as word was still getting out about the site having opened.

Bruce said that turnaround time for test results, which are processed by Quest, is expected to be roughly three or four days. Cornell Scott-Hill Health Center infectious disease experts plan to follow up every couple days with patients who test positive, because people with coronavirus can be doing relatively well and then, all of a sudden, they can fall quite ill.

Cornell Scott-Hill Health’s testing site will be open 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. daily.