Ons oxford study- not been swabbed this week

[Rubyroost]

Anyone else? So I should have had my 5th weekly swab before it changes to monthly. No contact at all this week. Has this happened to anyone else?

We had our 5th (a few weeks ago) but they didn't call us over the weekend for our first monthly one. They called yesterday and came then instead, a few days later than expected.

We are due our 2nd one on Sunday but not heard anything yet...

Oh we have been getting the callbthe evening before or sometimes on the day. We were done last weds for the 4th. Theyre cutting it thin for the 5th bearing in mind it's supposed to be weekly!

We are in the study too , we had a gap of over 2 weeks and then had one on the Friday and another the following Monday!

Just had our 5th on time

@pumpkinpie01 doesn't sound like a very reliable study! 😂

Yes, I had my first one then a 2 week gap until the second one! Had my third done yesterday on time.

It does seem to be intermittent, but this doesn't really take away from the integrity of the study as long as overall numbers per week are reasonably consistent.

We've been in it since April, out 1st 5 "weekly" swabs were over an 8 week period. Our monthly ones have varied between 3-5 week intervals.

We were 10 days late for our second blood test (the week 5 one), but had our third this week back on the original timetable.

The tester said it had been a bit chaotic when another tranche came into the survey. We had an hour's notice that she wanted to visit.

I think they have given up testing our teen daughter (nobody will visit after 3pm).

They came yesterday, rang me an hour before visit! 🙄

I am a Swab Tester working on the ONS study. The problem is getting equipment. I haven't been able to work for 3 days this week because I can't get the swabs - demand is far exceeding supply. I have had to cancel my allocated visits for these days - not something I do lightly, as if I don't work, I don't get paid.

Oh and re visiting after 3pm. We have to drop collected samples off with a courier within 24 hours.

I'm scheduled to work 5 days per week (I could choose to do more or less but this suits me). I happily do visits after my 3pm drop-off and deliver that evening's samples the next day on 4 of my 5 days, but on the 5th I can't, because that would mean driving up to the courier on a non-working day (so not paid).

Yes we are meant to be test 5 but didn’t get called last week. This week we got a call saying they would come last night but we got a text cancelling it yesterday morning. So we have now missed two weeks.

@ImpassiveVoice how far in advance to you get to see a list of people in your area needing to be tested?

Maybe it is our phlebotomists, or maybe it has changed, but they only get to see who needs testing the following day (so normally spend the evening ringing round trying to organise a route). It isn't uncommon to have to drive an hour from their home to test us and then discover that there is somebody needing to be tested a couple of miles away the next day. If they knew a couple of days in advance it would save them a lot of mileage.

We'd happily have somebody test the lot of us in the evening, or at a weekend (like was suggested in our original letter), but they don't seem to have hired people round here who are willing to work at these times.

I still think this and the Zoe study app are very useful contributions to figuring out what is going on.

@Madcats

The next day's list isn't confirmed until around 5pm the day before. If I've been out on evening visits, I may not be able to start phoning round until 7:30 / 8 pm. First, I have to plan my journey (Google maps) and get an idea of arrival times - including meeting up with the courier.

I can be doing over 100 miles in a day, plus the time spent at each address. A 1st visit is at least 30 mins per person (so a family of 5 can take 1.5 - 2 hours) and follow up viisits are around 15 - 20 mins per person.

It might not be about "willingness" to work the hours you're available. I don't necessarily know what kind of availability people have and if someone asks for an evening visit, I either have to re-do the journey plan to try to accommodate them, or I have to cancel the visit, because I've already offered that time slot to someone else who's 30 miles away. (Some people get really shirty - one woman said "thanks for nothing" before she slammed the phone down. Unfortunately, I think she still had time to hear my response ...)

Interestingly I've just had a text this evening asking if we can do 1pm tomorrow (Sunday). All previous visits have been scheduled for Wednesday, although due to availability they have then sometimes taken place on different days.
Ds2 has missed the last 2 monthly visits as he has been at school, so he will be pleased.

Chasing and/or Impassive I would be really interested to know how many school aged kids they do get to test. It's weird that ONS (or whoever) can't figure out who needs to be tested and when weeks in advance (+/- a day or two) when they have everybody's details and when they would normally be due for a test.

DD has been tested 2 out of 6 visits (luckily she hadn't made plans to spend her gift tokens, I appreciate that isn't the point....).

Agree that you'd think they could schedule the lists better (office admin compiling the lists rather than the individual testers).
My ds2 was tested from April through to August, then missed Sep & Oct as back at school.
Ds1 is at 6th form and they are week in / week online and the Sep & Oct swaps coincided with his online week so he's not missed any.

@Madcats - for the answer to this and other questions, you can see the latest ONS data release here: www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveypilot/6november2020 .

@Chasingsquirrels
It is actually "The Office" who decides on my list. As a Tester, I have no control over that. They do seem to limit the numbers of people on each day's list - up to 15 - but one day I might only have 7 people, all conveniently within a 10 mile radius and the next I'm driving for miles down muddy single track roads to find 4 addresses and test the whole family at each address. We use a smartphone to record the questionnaire answers (uploaded to the Cloud immediately nothing is saved on our phones) and if there's no mobile signal that's another problem to contend with.

ImpassiveVoice my previous post was meant to convey that I though that office admin could arrange the lists better, not that I thought it was the field workers responsibility or fault. Re-reading it I appreciate that it might not have come across as such.

Chasingsquirrels No problem - but I do have to remind myself that the people in The Office are many miles south of me - I'm used to correcting interesting phonetic versions of street names, villages and even quite large towns and I sometimes sigh at their notion of what is "local" for me.
I realise I've made it sound like this is all a big chore to me - it's not. I enjoy meeting people, I enjoy driving over the moors on a fine day and I'm lucky to have this job which suits me to a T.