Wait time for COVID-19 test results increasing for many in St. Louis area

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    ST.LOUIS, MI (KMOV) — A local urgent care chain says results from the COVID-19 tests it performs are taking longer to come back.

Total Access Urgent Care says one of the biggest issues is rising demand. A month ago, they were doing roughly 400 tests a day, that number has skyrocketed to around 1,600 per day.

Testing is increasing at sites around the area and that means test which were taking 3-5 days for results are now taking, in some cases, two full weeks.

“Its been very difficult, we’ve been trying really hard to work with Quest to meet reasonable customer expectations, but if you’re total time in quarantine is 10 days if you’re asymptomatic per CDC guidelines and it takes 11 days to get the test back, then its irrelevant, you would be cleared without symptoms and its very frustrating for patients,” said Dr. Troy Dinkel with Total Access Urgent Care.

Dr Dinkel said the labs where they send the tests are simply overwhelmed. They are working with other labs who are working to get results faster.

Total Access Urgent Care, along with several others, are testing anyone who wants a test. The St. Louis Metropolitan Pandemic Task Force says hospitals have their own labs and are able to turn around results much faster, often in 24 hours.

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