Self-collected gargle specimen as a patient-friendly sample collection method for COVID-19 diagnosis in a population context.

ABSTRACT: Scaling up SARS-CoV-2 testing and tracing continues to be plagued with the limitation of the sample collection method, which requires trained healthcare workers to perform and causes discomfort to the patients. In response, we assessed the performance and user preference of gargle specimens for qRT-PCR-based detection of SARS-CoV-2 in Indonesia. Inpatients who had recently been diagnosed with COVID-19 and outpatients who were about to perform qRT-PCR testing were asked to provide nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal (NPOP) swabs and self-collected gargle specimens. We demonstrated that self-collected gargle specimens can be an alternative specimen to detect SARS-CoV-2 and the viral RNA remained stable for 31 days at room temperature storage. The developed method was validated for use on multip

SUBMITTER: Utama R 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8904449 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature