‘We have a plentiful supply of tests’: Ready Responders CEO on number of at home COVID tests

Ready Responders are called on more than ever as the coronavirus crisis is effecting millions of people around America. Ready Responders Co-Founder & CEO Justin Dangel breaks down how the company is monitoring COVID-19 and testing patients of COVID-19 from their homes.

Video Transcript

JULIE HYMAN: Justin, thank you for joining us. There has been a lot of talk about the lack of availability of testing, right, in this country. So are you guys able to get the tests that you need in order to then get them to people's homes? And how does the whole process work?

JUSTIN DANGEL: So our home testing, which we launched last week in New Orleans and now are scaling across all of our markets in the next couple weeks-- Nevada, greater Washington, DC, Maryland, and New York-- we have a plentiful supply of tests through our partner, the hospital system Ochsner and also through other third parties that have access to tests at scale. There have been occasional slowdowns in processing times, but in terms of the kits and the ability to get in the home and do it, that's something that we've started doing here in Louisiana and we'll continue to do in the markets that we operate.

ADAM SHAPIRO: How difficult is it for you to actually protect the people who are going to the homes to test? Because we know, there's the shortage of, for instance, masks and gloves. What kinds of gear do they need?

JUSTIN DANGEL: Yeah, so our folks are equipped with full PPE. So all of our folks have the masks, shields, gloves, gowns-- everything that they need. We've been able to find some really solid sources of supply early on. I think we have a really visionary medical director who got us prepared early for what might be coming, and we've been able to stay fully operational-- providing house calls in the home, supported via video by our doctors through our force of EMTs and paramedics. We haven't had any examples of any of our folks contracting COVID in the line of duty. And that's a testament to the tools and systems that our chief medical officer and the rest of our team have put together.

JULIE HYMAN: So, Justin, can you share with those numbers of people that you've tested? And I also want to know sort of insurance-wise how this is all paid for. Are insurers covering this kind of thing at this point?

JUSTIN DANGEL: Yeah. So first of all, we've tested now a few people in Louisiana, and I think that will scale quite a bit as we move forward. This is a program that's a little bit more than a week old, and we, obviously, wanted to roll it out cautiously and make sure we had the systems in place. In terms of whether or not payers pay for it some-- Amerihealth comes to mind-- have been very quick to accept payment for testing. Others, that's still in development.

But in many cases, we provide a housecall alongside the testing, which involves our responder-- the EMTs or paramedics in the field, but supported via video by our doctors-- and those are billable for almost all payers. And at this point in the COVID period, we'll accept anyone, regardless of their insurance status. We'll go see people and provide a COVID or non-COVID related house call for whatever conditions they need. And as taking pressure off our hospital systems and replacing some of the visit capacity that's missing in the marketplace right now, we've decided to really answer the call.

We continue to add brave EMTs and paramedics to our platform and lots of doctors via telehealth capacity. And the ability to provide care at home-- it isn't just COVID testing for us, it's really almost anything you might go to a doctor's office or a non-emergency visit to the emergency room we can provide at home. And we're seeing a dramatic increase in need and calls on that front. And we decided to see anyone, regardless of insurance, whether they're in our network or not.

RICK NEWMAN: Justin, Rick Newman here-- many of us who don't understand the supply chains for tests are wondering, what is taking so long to get these tests out there. Can you just tell us what's going on in the supply chains and when you envision there might be enough tests so that everybody who needs a test can get one?

JUSTIN DANGEL: Sure. So I'm not an expert in testing and testing supply chain. I can only comment about our experience. So what we're mostly hearing is a pretty good supply of the tests that can get done, can get processed in a day or two right now, we're not seeing, in our case, a shortage. And we're hearing that two to three weeks out a great increase in supplies. So as we talk to the vendors that we're working with, this appears as though this is an issue that the supply chain is coming together for.

We're still relatively small-scale relative to some of the bigger testing centers. So I can only speak to our experience. But this looks as though it's a problem that is easing right now, and hopefully-- knock on wood-- will look a lot better in the next few weeks. I think in many cases, whether it was PPE or testing, we got out of the gates somewhat slowly generally. But things are moving pretty quickly, and a lot of the complaints about supply of everything seem to be easing quite a bit in the last handful of days, and testing is one of those that we're seeing much easier access to what we need.