BATON ROUGE – Patients no longer have to wait days before finding out their coronavirus test results. Lake Urgent Care/Lake After Hours is now offering new molecular testing that yields results in as little as five minutes.

“That waiting and wondering can tend to weigh on any of us, so the sooner we can get this result or any result of a diagnostic test to the patient is very, very important,” CEO of Premier Health Steve Sellers said.

Premier Health partners with Our Lady of the Lake. Sellers said the company Abbott Lab shipped the testing kits on Saturday.

“We’ve been offering their molecular flu and strep tests for the past three years now, so the COVID-19 tests also use the same technology and analyzers and so forth,” said Sellers.

Monday was the first time rapid testing was being used in Baton Rouge. The drive-up location is on O’Donovan Drive behind Our Lady of the Lake. A second location, in Denham Springs off highway 16, began testing over the weekend.

Patients do have to be screened before being testing. Sellers is encouraging people to do that virtually on their website, www.lakeurgentcare.com.