Here & Now

Gundersen Health System Develops In-House COVID-19 Test

Trevor Keller:

Gundersen Health System in La Crosse has developed their own in-house test for COVID-19. They say patients no longer need to wait days to get results.

Steven Callister:

If a test is required from the health system, we can turn around the results generally within 24 hours. You’re getting very real-time results of the number of cases that we’re seeing.

Trevor Keller:

To increase testing capacity, the Food and Drug Administration issued an emergency policy in February allowing labs to develop their own COVID-19 tests. Gundersen’s research lab finalized theirs last week, with an assist from the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse.

Scott Cooper:

We have a lot of collaborations with people at Gundersen. So anything we could do to get more tests in the community benefits everyone.

Trevor Keller:

The university’s biology, microbiology and chemistry departments donated important supplies that allow Gundersen’s lab to produce thousands of tests. The hope is it will help fight community spread. People with the virus can be quarantined and their close contacts tested more quickly.

Scott Cooper:

That’s going to be the key to slowing down this virus is you need to identify the people that have it.

Trevor Keller:

Gundersen says they have received calls from around the country about their in-house test. Gundersen doctors are encouraged about getting rapid results.

Todd Kowalski:

Where we stand right now, I’m not sure there’s a place in the United States I’d rather be than in Coulee country with the folks we have and the abilities we have to take this on.

Frederica Freyberg:

That was Trevor Keller reporting. For more information on innovative ways Wisconsin businesses are fighting against COVID-19, go to WisContext.org.