September 23, 2020

Evaluation of Pooled Sample Analysis Strategy in Expediting Case Detection in Areas with Emerging Outbreaks of COVID-19: A Pilot Study

Category: Article Summary

Topic: Testing and Treatment

Keywords (Tags): testing

• Pooling 5 nasopharyngeal or oropharyngeal samples during PCR testing would offer a reduction of laboratory turn-around time by 66% and the cost of diagnosis by 68%. However, the sensitivity was compromised, with 5 of the 109 pools showing discordant results when compared with individual results. Single samples with Ct value ³34 were likely to be missed in the pool. The negative predictive value of qRT-PCR on pooled samples was around 96%.

Singh et al. (Sept 22, 2020). Evaluation of Pooled Sample Analysis Strategy in Expediting Case Detection in Areas with Emerging Outbreaks of COVID-19: A Pilot Study. PLOS ONE. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0239492