Comparison of Unsupervised Home Self-collected Midnasal Swabs With Clinician-Collected Nasopharyngeal Swabs for Detection of SARS-CoV-2 Infection

Abstract

This diagnostic study compares unsupervised home self-collected midnasal swabs vs clinician-collected nasopharyngeal swabs for the detection of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2).

Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of Interest Disclosures: Dr Chu reported consulting with GlaxoSmithKline and Merck and receiving research funding from Sanofi Pasteur, Cepheid, and Ellume outside of the submitted work. Dr Greninger reported receiving personal fees from Abbott Molecular outside of the submitted work. Dr Englund reported consulting with Sanofi Pasteur and Meissa Vaccines outside the submitted work. No other disclosures were reported.

Figures

Figure.. Cycle Thresholds (Ct) for Home Self-collected Midnasal Swabs and Clinician-Collected Nasopharyngeal (NP) Swabs

Home self-collected midnasal swab (n = 28) Ct values were positively associated with the paired clinician-collected nasopharyngeal swab (n = 30) Ct value (correlation coefficient, 0.81; P = 5.1 × 10−6). The Ct values were calculated from a severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 reverse transcriptase–polymerase chain reaction assay that targets 2 distinct regions of the virus, using Centers for Disease Control and Prevention primers and probes for the virus nucleocapsid (N) gene, N1 and N2.