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
On July 9, 2020, Gov. Abbott issued a Proclamation suspending elective surgeries and procedures in hospitals in all counties located within 11 Trauma Service Areas (TSAs) in Texas. This proclamation amends the Governor’s previous Executive Order that included Cameron, Hidalgo, Nueces, Webb, Bexar, Dallas, Harris, and Travis counties. For a full listing of all the affected counties, please view the new Proclamation.
- 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
- Resources for Pharmacies
- Postmortem Guidance
- Laboratory Testing
- Overview of Testing for SARS-CoV-2 (CDC)
- 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 June 30, 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
- Gene by Gene
- Guadalupe Regional Medical Center
- GYN PATH Services, Inc.
- 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
▲ Top
This page is being updated as new information becomes available.