#Gravity lab jump full#

He wants people to know it’s a complicated time with a lot of moving parts. Headlines are abuzz about the long turnaround times for processing tests, and he is also frustrated by shortages, but there are still positives in the midst of all the chaos. That’s where Remington wants to focus now. Thermo Fisher, an instrument manufacturer, has been an amazing partner, he said. Medtronic, a medical device company where Remington had worked previously, shipped over even more. CTI, a neighboring clinical research and consulting company, sent gloves. But its warehouse is stacked floor to ceiling with boxes. Gravity’s biggest challenge, as for many others, has been securing protective gear for staff. Remington is proud of the community, too. You need hundreds of labs like Gravity to step up to fill the gap.” “Our employees, nobody’s stepped away from this. Right now, it’s bigger than us, and we feel motivated to do our part,” he said. “In a normal time, this would be an exciting thing it would be something we’d be celebrating. When employees need a break, there’s a stockpile of snacks, drinks and access to Netflix. He’s using local restaurants – for take out, of course – to keep employees fed, and is offering at-home daycare support, and other incentives.

“It’s our way to come together as a group and be there for each other,” Remington said. The COVID T-shirts were one of many attempts to keep morale high. But Remington said he wanted to staff the lab seven days a week in an effort to do more. Turnaround time will likely lag to about 48 hours as volumes increases. Most tests, he said, have been reported back to clinicians by the end of the day. It processes three samples.Īnd March 25, the total was 187. With Food and Drug Administration authorization in hand, Gravity Diagnostics begins testing for COVID-19. Those have looked a little like this:ĭay one, March 16. Although he’s an admitted social media novice, he has tried to post semi-regular updates online. He thinks Gravity could handle between 3,000-5,000 tests each day.

#Gravity lab jump full#

Andy Beshear said Thursday, more than 11,000 people have been tested across the state, Remington is hoping to roll out to full capacity at the lab soon. “We’re one of the few that jumped on this quick.”Ĭurrently, Gravity is working largely with hospitals in Kentucky and first responder groups to process tests for COVID-19. They would have stayed in their lane,” he said. “Most labs my size wouldn’t have even tried this. In the last week, Remington has hired six new employees, practically on the spot, to keep up with demand. Northern Kentucky Tri-ED, an economic development group, has helped it pick up more space. He ordered necessary instrumentation and accelerated the lab’s planned expansion next door. In other words, things were good.īut to do nothing? That wouldn’t have fit the company’s mantra, Remington said. The employee count had gone from zero to 120. Business was up 100 percent year-over-year. And it recorded its best month ever in February. It had added upper-respiratory testing to its repertoire two years ago, and that proved a good addition to the lab. Technically a startup, it was almost profitable.

Gravity Diagnostics, founded in 2014, was just getting into a flow. It would have been easy to say no, Remington said. Gravity Diagnostics is primarily in pharmacogenomics and toxicology field, the former of which looks at an individual’s DNA to gauge their response to certain medications, while the latter is used in an effort to reduce drug abuse and addiction.īut in January, as the novel coronavirus was starting its sweep across China, JP Canner, Gravity’s vice president of regulatory, clinical and research programs, asked if the company should try to validate a method to test for it. It’s an exponential jump, not to mention a big turnaround from its normal day-to-day. The lab could grow to test 15,000-20,000 such samples a week if needed. And CEO Tony Remington said it’s looking to do more. But, Gravity Diagnostics, at least it seems, is punching far above its weight. Staff at this tiny medical lab, located off Russell Street in Covington, Kentucky, have processed close to 1,500 novel coronavirus samples, one of many private outfits across the country cleared to do so in the midst of a global pandemic. Printed on the back, in white, bold, capital letters is a simple, but telling phrase: COVID-19 RESPONSE TEAM. But there’s still a feeling of unity among them, and a sense of cohesiveness, too, at least in the simple black T-shirt they each now wear. About three dozen employees at Gravity Diagnostics stand in a scattered, haphazard square.