Alliance for Pandemic Preparedness

February 20, 2020

Sensitivity of Chest CT for COVID-19: Comparison to RT-PCR

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  • Fang et al. investigated sensitivity of chest CT for COVID-19 in early diagnosis of disease. RT-PCR was used as gold standard and were conducted using throat swabs (45 patients) or sputum samples (6 patients) of 51 patients. Sensitivity of chest CT was greater than that of RT-PCR (98% vs 71%, respectively, p<.001). Limitation of RT-PCR as diagnostic tool is described.

Fang et al. (Feb 19, 2020) Sensitivity of Chest CT for COVID-19: Comparison to RT-PCR. Radiology. https://doi.org/10.1148/radiol.2020200432