The Indiana Department of Health (IDH) has created a formal process for long-term care facilities (both nursing facilities and assisted living communities) to request BinaxNOW™ point-of-care testing cards if a facility is in an outbreak and unable to provide outbreak testing with its current testing capacity. The entirety of the request guidance can be found here. Assisted living memory care units are also reminded that a LTC Newsletter sent on November 19 stated that assisted living communities with memory care units are expected to perform outbreak testing in these memory care units using the same outbreak guidance followed by nursing facilities, as outlined further below.
BinaxNow™ Request Process
To be eligible to request BinaxNOW™ point-of-care testing cards, long-term care facilities must:
- Have a CLIA Waiver or partner with an entity that has a CLIA Waiver;
- Be able to complete the training and documentation requirements for this point-of-care testing (i.e., reporting results via REDCap or NHSN);
- Have a source for their collection supplies and PPE;
- Demonstrate a quantifiable need based on a facility outbreak; and
- Be unable to provide outbreak testing with current testing capacity.
To request BinaxNOW™ point-of-care testing cards, eligible facilities should submit a 213 RR Form to isdhdeplogistics@isdh.in.gov and include the following information:
- Name, email address, and phone number of the requestor;
- Name of the long-term care facility;
- Name, email address, and phone number of the delivery point-of-contact;
- Address where the kits would be delivered; and
- CLIA ID number and expiration date.
Eligible facilities will receive 2 cases (1,280 tests are in each case) on a first come, first serve basis. IDH can only fulfill one request per requesting entity at this time. Deliveries will be organized once a week. Questions on this process may be directed to Sara Blosser (sblosser@isdh.in.gov) or Andrea Thurlow (athurlow@isdh.in.gov).
Assisted Living Memory Care Unit Testing
Assisted living memory care units are also reminded that a LTC Newsletter sent on November 19th stated that assisted living communities with memory care units are expected to perform outbreak testing in these memory care units using the same outbreak guidance followed by nursing facilities (i.e., when one case is identified among residents or staff of a memory care unit, all residents and staff of that memory care unit should be tested every 3-7 days until no new cases are identified for 14 days). For IHCA/INCAL’s summary on this LTC Newsletter, please click here.
Importantly, IDH has stated that it does not anticipate having to enforce this expectation, but IDH does expect assisted living communities to conduct outbreak testing in memory care units using the resources provided by the state when a case is identified. If a memory care unit does have an outbreak and action is not taken (whether that action is using the resources provided by the state or reaching out to IDH for additional assistance), then IDH will evaluate on a case-by-case basis whether action should be taken.
For AHCA/NCAL’s most up-to-date COVID-19 testing vendor list, please click here. Please note, Hensler Surgical was recently added and ships point-of-care antigen tests.