Shorecare’s experience as a COVID-19 testing centre

Since transforming into a testing facility in less than 48 hours on the 21st March, the team at Shorecare Northcross have so far tested over 16,000 people in the wider North Shore and Rodney district. Sarah Peters, Nurse Manager said that “staff really pulled together and got stuck in with the ever-changing processes that we threw at them. It was amazing to see”.

Shorecare Northcross is the only community-based assessment centre in Auckland that has had booked appointments. This has helped to reduce traffic disruption at the busy Oteha Valley and East Coast Road intersection and enable laboratory forms and swabs to be prepared in advance. After an appointment is made, security are informed of each patient’s surname, appointment time, and car registration number, which has helped to streamline the process. For those that cannot drive to the clinic, Shorecare have repurposed a dental bus from Waitemata District Health Board, which they have nicknamed the “Scooby bus”.

Staffing has been a significant challenge, with at least four administration staff, two clinic support workers, six nurses and one doctor being on duty at all times. In addition, there has also been at least two to four staff assigned to the mobile unit. To cope with this additional workload, three new staff were hired to assist with the phone calls, two of whom are staying on in other roles.

Felicity Craft, Marketing and Administration Support reports that “morale has been high at Northcross despite everyone working incredibly hard. Some of the highlights have been the gifts and messages from a number of patients and companies and the epic COVID-19 themed song and dance video put together by the team”. At this stage, Shorecare Northcross is expecting to be back open for urgent care appointments on the 3rd August 2020.