The Department of Health and Senior Services has advised medical providers in Missouri that calls to the 24/7 COVID-19 hotline, it’s noticed three points of miscommunication and hopes to calm citizens by correcting the information.
- A patient will not be able to get their coronavirus test results through the hotline, even if the test was performed by the Missouri State Public Health Laboratory (MSPHL). The MSPHL, like other testing laboratories, provides a result back to the healthcare requestor. The healthcare requestor or local public health agency is the entity that will inform the patient of their results.
- A patient cannot call and get the approval of themselves to be tested by the MSPHL, even if the healthcare provider believes they meet the current DHSS testing criteria. The request must come from a healthcare provider. At this time, we are not aware of any testing site that allows testing without screening and requests by a healthcare provider.
- Some providers are transferring their public line to the state COVID-19 hotline without a message to their callers that this is happening. While the COVID-19 hotline is here to help, we have received frustrated callers because they are wanting to speak with the entity they originally called.
