![Before the novel coronavirus, Cleveland Clinic lab technician Tricia Johnson had experience dealing with the H1N1 virus and the Ebola virus. [Cleveland Clinic]](https://npr.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/7adadae/2147483647/strip/true/crop/3000x2250+0+0/resize/840x630!/format/webp/quality/90/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2Flegacy%2Fuploads%2F2021%2F3%2F22%2FTricia%20Johnson%20lab%202.jpg)
In the early days of the pandemic, testing for the coronavirus was critical for measuring its spread through the community. But testing kits were limited and only a few labs could perform the work.
The Cleveland Clinic was one of the first hospitals in the country to do in-house testing. Tricia Johnson, a medical laboratory scientist in the clinic鈥檚 Department of Molecular Microbiology, said when she and her colleagues first heard about COVID-19, they began by treating it like other pandemics.
鈥淲e lived through the H1N1 2009 pandemic, we have seen the Ebola crisis and how we dealt with it. So we were kind of approaching it the same way we do for all pandemics,鈥� Johnson said. 鈥淲e kind of use caution and then figure out, 鈥極k, so how are we going to test this?鈥欌��
To develop a test, they had to learn more about the novel coronavirus, Johnson said. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention developed a test to detect for the coronavirus, and the Cleveland Clinic adapted that test, so Johnson and other lab technicians could replicate it, she said.
Being able to test in-house helped speed up the process because they no longer had to send the sample to the CDC.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 why it was so great to have the opportunity here to do the testing,鈥� she said.
At the same time, normal lab work at the clinic continued, putting extra stress on Johnson鈥檚 team.
鈥淲hen COVID-19 hit, our team was kind of split into two halves,鈥� she said. 鈥淗alf of us are focused to do COVID-19 testing. We were trained to do it and just do the analysis and all of that stuff.鈥�
The other half kept up with their original workload, which included testing for HPV, sexually transmitted diseases, and viruses.
Johnson said it鈥檚 been overwhelming, but teamwork has helped them get through the past year.
鈥淲e鈥檝e been working through lunches, we鈥檙e just exhausted, we鈥檝e been doing more than enough work than we鈥檝e ever done before,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 been crazy, but just an amazing way that our team is just showing we can work through anything basically.鈥�
