Texas Case Counts 
DSHS has compiled the following resources to assist hospitals and healthcare professionals in their planning and response to COVID‑19.
On this page:
- Evaluating Patients
- Preparedness Tools
- Hospital Reporting Requirements
On March 24, 2020, Gov. Abbott issued an Executive Order relating to daily reporting during the COVID‑19 disaster. For more information, see the following:
- Resuming Elective Procedures
A licensed healthcare facility wishing to resume elective surgeries or procedures covered within Governor Abbott’s Executive Order No. GA‑15 must email a letter to the Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) certifying that it will:
- Reserve at least 25% of its hospital capacity for treatment of COVID‑19 patients, accounting for the range of clinical severity of COVID‑19 patients; and
- Not request any personal protective equipment from any public source, whether federal, state, or local, for the duration of the COVID‑19 disaster.
The format, content, and submission requirements for the certification letter can be found in HHSC's Executive Order GA-15 Licensed Health Care Facilities Certification Guidance Letter. For any questions, please contact the HHSC Policy, Rules, and Training Unit at HCQ_PRT@hhsc.state.tx.us.
- Infection Control
- Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
- Requests for Assistance from DSHS (PPE, etc.)
Hospitals and healthcare professionals should follow their normal process of trying to locate emergency medical supplies, personal protective equipment (PPE), and other healthcare resources with their regular vendors and exhaust all possible options. These options may include contacting any sister facilities for coordination, reaching out to local partners or stakeholders, looking at any possible reallocations within the Public Health Region, Healthcare Coalition, Regional Advisory Council regions, or other medical supply agencies, given established priority groups. If hospitals and healthcare professionals cannot obtain any PPE from their vendor(s) and have exhausted all alternative options, they should send their official requests to their local office of emergency management via the State of Texas Assistance Request (STAR) process. Please ensure you provide all relevant details for your request, to include type of item, POC information, and delivery address.
- Recent Developments in COVID-19 Treatment & Products
- Isolation Precautions for COVID-19
- DSHS Interim Guidance for Persons Isolated at Home, including Healthcare Personnel, with Confirmed or Probable COVID‑19 (ENGLISH) (PDF, V.4.0, updated 5/19/2020)
- DSHS Interim Guidance for Persons Isolated at Home, including Healthcare Personnel, with Confirmed COVID-19 (SPANISH) (PDF, V.3.0, released 5/12/2020)
- DSHS Strategies for Releasing Cases and Contacts from Home Isolation and Quarantine (PDF, V.2.1, updated 5/19/2020)
- DSHS Strategies for Healthcare Personnel with Confirmed or Probable COVID-19 to Return to Work from Home Isolation (PDF, V.2.2, updated 5/19/2020)
- CDC Symptom-Based Strategy to Discontinue Isolation for Persons with COVID-19
- CDC Interim Guidance on Discontinuation of Transmission-Based Precautions and Disposition of Patients in Healthcare Settings
- CDC Interim Guidance on Criteria for Return to Work for Healthcare Personnel with Confirmed or Suspected COVID-19
- CDC Guidance for Immunocompromised Individuals
- Resources for Pharmacies
- Postmortem Guidance
- Laboratory Testing
- COVID-19 Testing Notice: DSHS Austin Laboratory
- Interim Guidelines for Collecting, Handling, and Testing Clinical Specimens from Persons for COVID‑19 (CDC)
- Fact Sheet for Patients (CDC)
- Fact Sheet for Healthcare Providers (CDC)
- As of April 13, the following private and hospital labs are offering, or will shortly begin offering, COVID‑19 testing:
- Access DX Laboratory, LLC
- Advanced Genomics
- ARUP
- BioReference
- Chattahoochee Physicians Laboratory Services, LLC
- Coleman County Medical Center
- Convergent Diagnostics, LLC
- Conviva
- Coryell Health
- CPL
- Culberson Hospital
- Dallas LTCH, LLC
- DTR Labs, LLC
- El Campo Memorial Hospital
- Frio Regional Hospital
- Fulgent Genetics
- Guadalupe Regional Medical Center
- Haskell Memorial Hospital
- Health Texas Providers Network
- Houston Methodist
- iGenomeDx
- KBMO Diagnostics LLC
- Kindred Hospital Dallas Central
- LabCorp
- Livingston Med Lab, LLC
- Longview Regional Medical Center
- Magnolia Diagnostics
- Medical City Dallas
- Medical Diagnostic Laboratories
- Memorial Health System
- NETIMA
- North Central Surgical Center Hospital
- Post Acute Medical Rehabilitation Hospital of Round Rock
- Quest
- Rice Medical Center
- San Angelo Community Medical Center
- Schleicher County Medical Center
- Sonic Reference Lab Inc.
- Supreme Medical Laboratories
- Texas Health
- Texas Med Clinic Provider Group, PLLC
- The Colony ER Hospital
- TotalCare Emergency Room
- Tyler County Hospital District
- UT Southwestern Medical Center
- UT Health Austin
- Viracor-Eurofins
- W.J. Mangold Memorial Hospital
- COVID‑19 and Newborn Screening: During this time of extraordinary challenge, the DSHS Newborn Screening (NBS) Program appreciates the dedication and commitment of healthcare providers to ensure the best possible outcomes for Texas newborns. Please visit the DSHS Laboratory's COVID‑19 and Newborn Screening FAQs page for important information.
For disease reporting and/or local assistance, see the listing of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Local Health Entities.
COVID-19 Testing Notice: DSHS Austin Laboratory
As of Monday, April 13, 2020, the Texas DSHS Austin Laboratory will begin utilizing the PerkinElmer New Coronavirus Nucleic Acid Detection Kit and chemagic extraction platform to expand capacity for COVID-19 testing. The CDC 2019-Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Real-Time RT-PCR Diagnostic Panel will continue to be available until current supply resources are exhausted.
- Acceptable specimens include nasopharyngeal (NP) or oropharyngeal (OP) swabs, combined NP/OP swabs, and nasal swabs in Viral Transport Media (VTM), Universal Transport Media (UTM), liquid Amies media, and sterile saline.
- For further details regarding the PerkinElmer New Coronavirus Nucleic Acid Detection Kit, see the following:
Please continue to use the COVID‑19 Specimen Collection and Submission Instructions located on the DSHS Laboratory website for specimen collection, handling, and shipping guidance.
ALL specimens for COVID‑19 testing require preapproval. Contact your Local Health Department or DSHS Public Health Region to ensure patient meets Person Under Investigation (PUI) criteria for testing and to obtain DSHS approval to test. Specimens MUST meet DSHS PUI criteria prior to shipping and WILL NOT be tested without prior approval. Please DO NOT ship specimens prior to receiving this approval.
Updated 4/13/2020
Healthcare professionals can also find interim guidance (including patient evaluation, reporting, testing, specimen collection, and prevention and control recommendations) on the CDC website:
CDC Guidance for Health Professionals
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This page is being updated as new information becomes available.