September 17, 2020

Self-Collected Saline Gargle Samples as an Alternative to Healthcare Worker Collected Nasopharyngeal Swabs for COVID-19 Diagnosis in Outpatients

Category: Article Summary

Topic: Testing and Treatment

Keywords (Tags): testing

• [Pre-print, not peer reviewed] Self-collected saline mouth rinse/gargle samples and saliva samples had a sensitivity of 98% (39/40) and 79% (26/33), respectively, compared to healthcare worker (HCW)-collected nasopharyngeal swab samples among 40 people with SARS-CoV-2. Both types of self-collected samples showed stable viral RNA detection after 2 days of storage at room temperature and demonstrated higher user acceptability ratings than HCW-collected NP swabs.

Goldfarb et al. (Sept 14, 2020). Self-Collected Saline Gargle Samples as an Alternative to Healthcare Worker Collected Nasopharyngeal Swabs for COVID-19 Diagnosis in Outpatients. Pre-print downloaded Sept 18 from https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.09.13.20188334