February 3, 2021

The Limit of Detection Matters: The Case for Benchmarking Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 Testing

Category: Article Summary

Topic: Testing and Treatment

Keywords (Tags): testing

A study modeling the clinical sensitivity of assays to detect SARS-CoV-2 based on their limits of detection (LoD) found that each 10-fold increase in LoD was expected to lower the assay sensitivity by about 13%. Ct values were obtained from 4,700 SARS-CoV-2 positive patients using the Abbott SARS-CoV-2 EUA test. The authors argue that assays with the highest LoD’s (i.e. incapable of detecting low copy numbers) will miss a majority of infected individuals. 

Arnaout et al. (Feb 3, 2020). The Limit of Detection Matters: The Case for Benchmarking Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 Testing. Clinical Infectious Diseases. https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciaa1382/6127024