---
title: "Matt Collins of Covid Clinic: How Scaling Rapid Testing Infrastructure and Frontline Service Reshaped Public Health Delivery"
url: "https://authoritymag.co/articles/matt-collins-of-covid-clinic-how-scaling-rapid-testing-infrastructure-and-frontline-service-resh"
publisher: "Authority Magazine"
author: "Authority Magazine Editorial Staff"
authorUrl: "https://authoritymag.co/authors/authority-magazine-editorial-staff"
interviewee: "Matt Collins"
company: "Covid Clinic"
category: "Wellness"
datePublished: "2023-03-15T12:55:22.076Z"
dateModified: "2026-11-12T17:07:08.030Z"
tags: "Wellness"
---

# Matt Collins of Covid Clinic: How Scaling Rapid Testing Infrastructure and Frontline Service Reshaped Public Health Delivery

*The CEO of Covid Clinic shares how pivoting from solar and security entrepreneurship to healthcare operations helped scale nationwide testing and improve the patient experience during a global crisis.*

> My approach to developing processes is to thoroughly understand what the process needs to solve. How do we greet patients? What information do we ask them to input on the online form?

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T*he COVID-19 Pandemic taught all of us many things. One of the sectors that the pandemic put a spotlight on was the healthcare industry. The pandemic showed the resilience of the US healthcare system, but it also pointed out some important areas in need of improvement.*

*In our interview series called “*[In Light Of The Pandemic, Here Are The 5 Things We Need To Do To Improve The US Healthcare System](https://medium.com/authority-magazine/search?q=In%20Light%20Of%20The%20Pandemic)*”, we are interviewing doctors, hospital administrators, nursing home administrators, and healthcare leaders who can share lessons they learned from the pandemic about how we need to improve the US Healthcare System.*

*As a part of this series, I had the pleasure to interview Matt Collins.*

*Matt Collins is the CEO of Covid Clinic, a nationwide network of COVID-19 testing sites that provides a comprehensive and robust suite of COVID-19 tests, which are either processed on-site or sent to CLIA certified labs. Vaccinations are also available through licensed health care providers at select Covid Clinic’s testing sites in California. Matt is responsible for making vaccines and testing more accessible, physically working on the sites to better understand patient and staff experience, and working on strategic partnerships with cities, counties, states, school districts, and large organizations. He has also been integral in developing processes that each site uses to ensure the best patient and staff experience.*

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**Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive into our interview, our readers would like to get to know you a bit. Can you tell us a bit about your backstory and a bit about what brought you to this specific career path?**

The story starts with how I met my co-founder, now president of Covid Clinic, Dr. Matt Abinante. He and I have been friends for the better part of a decade, which started when our wives introduced us to each other. It was a natural phone call for him to make when he started testing people for COVID-19 and was overwhelmed. He opened this pop-up clinic at the Westminster Mall in March 2020. It was one of the first in the country. News helicopters were flying overhead and a news crew was on site interviewing Dr. Abinante. A snake line 400 cars long took up the whole parking lot. It was pandemonium. Because of the news coverage, there was no marketing necessary. Everyone showed up at once to get tested and Dr. Abinante didn’t have any infrastructure. He called me and said, “I need help, I’m just a doctor who wants to help people.” The idea at that point was not about building a company or organization. He just wanted to be able to test more people.

I was running New Power Inc., which is a solar sales and installation company and SmartTecc Inc., a home security company. I graduated from BYU’s Marriott School of Business with an emphasis on entrepreneurship. My passions, as far as being an entrepreneur go, are creating efficient processes and scaling. I enjoy creating value and the best customer experience for the patient, strategy, efficiency, and process. That’s what makes me tick. This has been a great privilege to have such an opportunity to scale something, to try to be as efficient as possible, while balancing that with the fact we’re saving lives. I’m proud to say that has always been the priority.

**Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you founded Covid Clinic?**

I think the overarching thing was a surprising and interesting change. Initially, I thought I was coming in to help my doctor friend for one to two months. Instead, I found myself consumed by the need to serve patients. I had this opportunity to make an impact and save lives. It’s been engaging for many who have stepped away from their careers and jumped in because we knew we could make a difference with our talents. It’s always been patients first. It’s what drives us. Within my first week, I found myself in full PPE talking to patients in their cars. My approach to developing processes is to thoroughly understand what the process needs to solve. How do we greet patients? What information do we ask them to input on the online form? How do we interact with them once they arrive already registered? The best way for me to learn was to get on the front lines. I have personally checked in at least 2,000 patients, worked hundreds of hours checking patients in.

**Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?**

It’s not a life lesson quote, but a song I like by Imagine Dragons called*Whatever it Takes*. It’s helped drive me through the challenges. Running Covid Clinic has been a huge challenge. I’ve had to lean on that mantra, as short as it is, “whatever it takes.” I don’t let discouragement or setbacks get to me, I just remember you have to do whatever it takes, within ethical and moral boundaries of course. When the going gets tough, I remind myself that I’m committed to doing whatever it takes, serving patients, and making testing and vaccinations more accessible for all.

**Are you working on any exciting new projects now for Covid Clinic? How do you think that will help people?**

Yes, Covid Clinic recently helped out with the The Baja Beach Fest, which gave us inspiration for how we can assist with other in-person events. Event access projects are exciting because of the impact it can have on the entire event industry. Many events attract guests from all over the country. Who can you partner with to provide rapid testing services that has the time to integrate with your ticketing system? That’s a very short list. That’s exciting because of the impact it will have on the industry and people being able to attend an event in a convenient way without having to fly across the country just to find out they’re COVID positive at the venue and get turned away.

We’re excited to serve schools and we’re also finding a gap in service at the community college level. That’s an interesting opportunity because many of the larger colleges and universities have labs on site, they have the resources to develop their own programs. But many community colleges don’t have those resources. We’re working with several community colleges to help bridge this gap since they’re an underserved segment.

**How would you define an “excellent healthcare provider”?**

Definitely one that puts patient care and patient experience first, and, and develops everything else around that. You have to prioritize patient care and experience.

**The COVID-19 pandemic has put intense pressure on the American healthcare system. Some healthcare systems were at a complete loss as to how to handle this crisis. Can you share with our readers a few examples of where we’ve seen the U.S. healthcare system struggle? How do you think we can correct these specific issues moving forward?**

The healthcare system has struggled to make testing and vaccination services accessible to all populations. Many segments of the U.S. population don’t have great access to testing and vaccination. Rural communities are especially underserved. But the biggest shortcoming has been access to testing. From February to June, a good portion of service providers, hospitals, and urgent care facilities stopped testing. During this time, Covid Clinic was actually growing and opening more and more sites.

Testing is just not as accessible as it should be and there are a lot of private companies and many groups that are just in it for the money. I think that most businesses approach this from a commercial, not a public health perspective. We hung in there and kept opening more locations because we are committed to patients and making testing vaccination more accessible.

Put patients first and consider that we’re in a pandemic. That’s how we can correct some of these issues.

**Healthcare professionals were true heroes on the front lines of the crisis. The COVID vaccines are saving millions of lives. Can you share a few ways that our healthcare system really did well? Please share a story or example.**

The story is the people who work in the healthcare system who have sacrificed so much to serve patients. They are the heroes and whether they’re on the front lines or someone who works remotely and processes billing, or facilitates greater delivery of services to sick patients, whoever is behind-the-scenes facilitating greater access to care or testing and vaccinations is a hero. It’s those people that have stepped up, whether on the front lines or behind them to treat the pandemic, whether it be testing, vaccinations, care, saving lives in hospitals, putting in sacrifice and taking time away from their families. They are the heroes.

You have call centers interacting with patients, people on the other side of a chat box who are sitting there late at night trying to answer patient questions about what they should do now that they tested positive. You have nurse practitioners and physician’s assistants who are doing telemedicine night and day. We’ve seen that with our own staff. These people aren’t on the front lines, they don’t go out in the field. Then it’s the payers themselves if I can give them credit. Even at the federal level systems are stressed, people are putting in extra time to try to meet the demands that the pandemic puts on all facets of the systems that have to process the delivery of services to patients. Anyone who supports delivery of services to patients is a hero. Many of them are never recognized. I know so many of them put in extra time and sacrifice. If they’re on salary, they probably didn’t get extra compensation for that extra time they put in.

I know so many have put in the extra time and sacrifice without being credited for it. I can’t give credit to healthcare in general, and all too often it’s only the frontline workers who are recognized, but there’s so much behind them that has not been well recognized.

**As a healthcare leader can you share 5 changes that need to be made to improve the overall US healthcare system? Please share a story or example for each one.**

1. Patients always need to be put first
2. Care needs to be medically necessary. Many providers have taken advantage of the pandemic and committed fraud. Some of that’s already coming up and they’re getting charged but the care needs to be medically necessary and ethically administered. We’ve always built our systems and processes to support that.
3. There needs to be greater access to care based on a patient’s choice. Many states and payors require physician orders for patients to receive service, otherwise, payers will not pay. Although there’s a clear purpose that justifies why physician orders are necessary, it shouldn’t preclude patients from choosing to get the care that they want when they want it, even if they decide against using their insurance. Patients should have choice, greater access to care, diagnostic services and to get the treatment that they need. Depending on what insurance provider they’re with, or network they’re in, it could take months to see the right physician in the right specialty instead of being able to just go out and get the care they need when they need it. That’s the tragedy.
4. New channels to deliver care diagnostics, services, whether that’s a drive-thru service or model, quick in-and-out is very important. More services made available in a convenient way like that.
5. Better benefits and compensation for healthcare workers. We’ve seen that it’s very difficult to retain healthcare workers because the pandemic is very stressful. Being at Covid Clinic can be stressful because you’re on the front lines. I’ve spoken with many who work in hospitals and urgent care facilities and there’s definitely a consensus that they feel undervalued and undercompensated. I would say at least 30% of healthcare workers feel undervalued and underappreciated. Hospital groups and some urgent care groups are very large and have this position of power over healthcare workers. Healthcare workers need to be appreciated and compensated better, with greater benefits for the work that they do.

**How do you think we can address the problem of physician shortages?**

My dad was a podiatrist. I even considered going into medicine, but my dad persuaded me not to. He saw a very clear shift and control away from physicians and the opportunities they used to have to power with the insurance companies that dictate what can and can’t be billed, and how much they’re going to pay. The opportunity to go into medicine is not what it used to be. If there is a shortage of physicians, it’s very likely because insurance companies have taken too much control and lobbied too far, that the opportunity for healthcare providers and physicians is not what it used to be. I probably would have become a physician had my dad not talked me out of it. I didn’t become a physician because I talked to one I trusted and he advised me against it.

**How do you think we can address the issue of physician burnout?**

Make the opportunity better. It’s that simple. If they had greater incentive to work harder, there would be more physicians and less burnout. I’m exasperated by the fact that there aren’t enough physicians. They probably don’t feel like the work they’re doing is worth the effort.

**What concrete steps would have to be done to actually manifest all of the changes you mentioned? What can individuals, corporations, communities and leaders do to help?**

Become activists for change in the healthcare industry to promote better pay and benefits for healthcare workers, to take some power and authority away from all these Fortune 500 insurance companies. It seems corrupt to me as an outsider that insurance companies are the most influential organizations and lobby for what those dollar amounts that are paid to physicians, or to urgent care, or hospitals should be. Why is that so backwards? Why would the payer be the one that dictates? You see a lot of physicians going to a cash-only model or a subscription, direct primary care model. It puts the power back in their practice and gives them more control over their business. That reflects a protest or a movement away from the system and the traditional practices that system endorses.

If there’s going to be a change it has to start by countering the power and lobbying wielded by these powerful companies. Lobbying groups include a lot of money from payers and the largest hospital groups and chains. Because they have so much money and so much power, the problem in the healthcare system is actually getting worse. They just can continue to snowball the amount of power they have over how the system is run. The majority of Americans would agree that the healthcare system in the United States is broken and it’s not serving patients well. That’s the most obvious indicator that there needs to be change regarding how healthcare is managed, administered, and who ultimately has the power to dictate what should be paid for a particular service and how a doctor should run their practice.

**If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?**

A nonprofit organization that helps rid the world of this pandemic by serving international communities that are receiving very little care to support testing and vaccination. That is a mission that needs to be fulfilled for at least the next 5–10 years.

It reminds me of *The Hunger Games because* I think that certain segments of the world population are going to feel that the pandemic is behind them while many will not be served and get beyond the pandemic. More people will get sick and still more will die. This is something that needs to happen on a global scale and it needs to be done through donations from governments and goodwill, a great deal of goodwill, procured from wealthier populations of countries in order to serve those parts of the world that aren’t so fortunate. The most fortunate populations need to stop thinking about their own problems and themselves and help now, but also help as long as it’s needed.

**How can our readers further follow your work online?**

The best way is to visit our website: [www.covidclinic.org](http://www.covidclinic.org) or our Facebook page:

[https://www.facebook.com/covidclinic](https://www.facebook.com/covidclinic).

**Thank you so much for these insights! This was very inspirational and we wish you continued success in your great work.**

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Source: https://authoritymag.co/articles/matt-collins-of-covid-clinic-how-scaling-rapid-testing-infrastructure-and-frontline-service-resh (Authority Magazine, Wellness). Interviewee answers are first-person statements of the guest. Index of all pages: https://authoritymag.co/llms.txt