When Connecticut’s health department saw Planned Parenthood of Southern New England was reporting an uptick in positive sexually transmitted infection tests, they were concerned.
However, Medical Director Dr. Ayiti Maharaj-Best was happy to tell them it was a good thing—proof that their new express testing method was working and that they were seeing a significant increase in patients.
Patients can now swab themselves and get tested without meeting a doctor.
“As much as we work to create a comfortable environment for testing, for a lot of people, just the thought of having to undress can be a reason that they don't come in,” Maharaj-Best said.
Maharaj-Best said PPSNE performed 54,000 more STI tests in 2024 than in 2023, thanks to the new express testing. PPSNE services Connecticut and Rhode Island.
While self-testing may be a big seller to patients, it also offers shorter wait times because it doesn’t require a clinician to be with every patient for the duration of their test.
“Our goal with this strategy was to help reduce the barriers and to make it easier to get to that diagnosis for people who have STIs,” Maharaj-Best said. “We know that the faster we can get people in for testing, the sooner we can make a diagnosis, and that also helps to curb the spread.”
Even if patients are self-swabbing, Maharaj-Best said, they still get all the information they would have if they saw a doctor. They’re taught to swab all of the areas of their body that could carry an infection — not just the urinary tract — and given information about safe sex and pharmaceutical treatments like PrEP.
Due to individual state laws, express testing isn’t available at every Planned Parenthood location.
But Maharaj-Best said it’s the “way of the future.”
