Huntsville Hospital officials are working to open a “fever clinic” next week where people can go directly for coronavirus testing, even people without a physician to refer them. The hospital may even open a drive-thru testing option.

“They could see a physician or nurse practitioner, be evaluated, treated and tested on the spot,” hospital Chief Operating Officer Jeff Samz said Friday. “We hope to have up for a short time to give people an option that is not the emergency room."

“We may even do things in your car.”

An Alabama-based private lab was granted approval Thursday to begin testing for the coronavirus and has begun taking samples at drive-thru locations in Vestavia Hills and Bessemer. That lab will be able to perform 10,000 tests in a week.

Related: Alabama private lab gains approval to test for coronavirus

"Up until just the last day or two, testing in Alabama has been limited to the state lab,” Sams said. “That is expanding pretty rapidly. Several of the private labs are now available to accept samples, so that is increasing availability and that will expand next week.”

Sams said Huntsville Hospital hopes to be able to process coronavirus tests in its own laboratory “within a week or so” increasing options.

The goal of the clinic, beyond providing additional testing, is to ease the demand on the hospital’s emergency room. Sams confirmed that Huntsville area physicians were referring patients to the hospital for testing in the early stages of the outbreak, but that has lessened.

"If we don’t need to bring you into the hospital where other people are, we’re going to try not to,“ he said.