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A Fort Payne, Alabama medical lab began conducting and analyzing COVID-19 tests this week and has quickly begun to conduct hundreds of such tests as one of many new testing companies helping to determine who is infected with the growing coronavirus.
Gene Cleckler, owner of Data Test Program Management (DTPM) and its molecular testing subsidiary Tide Laboratories, said Friday his company received anywhere from three to 500 samples a day since launching the COVID-19 virus testing on Monday after gaining regulatory authorization a week ago.
"We're going to two shifts and handle this to the best of our ability," he said. "Our goal is to report results in 72 hours and we are close to that so far."
Cleckler said so far DTPB has received specimens from its customer laboratories in a half dozen states.
The assessment of how many and what people may have the coronavirus has been restricted, to some extend, due to limited supplies of approved tests for the virus. Vice President Mike Pence, the head of the White House task force fighting the coronavirus, said Friday that more than 500,000 tests for the COVID-19 virus have now been conducted across the country in what he said was "a surge" of new testing capability across the country in recent weeks.
As of Wednesday, the COVID tracking project by the U.S. Bureau of Census said 11,796 people had been tested in Tennessee and 6,319 persons were tested in Georgia.
Cleckler, a 58-year-old entrepreneur who owns several businesses, began his business career fighting a different type of enemy - drug abuse. He got into medical testing as an outgrowth of a DeKalb County nonprofit drug treatment program he founded at the Family Life Center in 1993.
The for-profit medical testing company was created to provide drug testing for the center and began doing testing for other similar drug treatment programs around the country nearly two decades ago. The business has grown to serve physician practices and drug courts by helping them set up labs to serve their own medical and drug testing.
DTPM has nearly 75 employees, most of whom are in Fort Payne, and usually installs and manages laboratories in physician's offices and reference laboratories, Cleckler said. The company provides everything from equipment, reagents, and consulting services to laboratories to ensure they properly operate.
DTPM's primary business focus is toxicology and molecular laboratories.
But at a company meeting in January with DTPM managers from across the country, Cleckler said company leaders decided to develop their own test for the coronavirus and ordered all of its supplies to complete the design of the assays or tests was done by late January.
Cleckler's company developed a test using a process called polymerase chain reaction to identify coronavirus genes. Tide Laboratories used data released by Chinese scientists and the lab was able last month to secure an actual sample of coronavirus to make sure the test was accurate.
The company tested its first 300 samples Monday after gaining regulatory approval last week. DTPM, which regularly works with about 700 labs around the country, expects to receive specimens through is partner labs across the country.
Typically, DTPM distributes assays or tests to other labs for on-site testing and turns around the results within 24 hours. The company has petitioned the FDA to distribute its assays to remote sites, but for now all of the tests are being shipped to Fort Payne where the lab analysis is conducted.
Getting enough of some medical supplies makes it hard for Cleckler to make predictions about how many tests his company could ultimately perform.
"The key right now is getting these swabs," Cleckler said. "We have a limited amount and we are doling them out and we won't let any of our customers order any large quantities."
At the current rate, Cleckler said the company has a couple of week's supply of swabs for its testing capacity, but Pence and other federal officials insist that U.S. businesses are boosting production for all types of supplies needed to fight the virus.
Contact Dave Flessner at dflessner@timesfreepress.com or at 757-6340