Result for
Topic: Testing and Treatment
October 28, 2020
Head-to-Head Comparison of SARS-CoV-2 Antigen-Detecting Rapid Test with Self-Collected Anterior Nasal Swab versus Professional-Collected Nasopharyngeal Swab
[Pre-print, not peer reviewed] A direct comparison between the STANDARD Q-COVID-19 Antigen Test (Ag-RDT) (Roche) and an approved RT-PCR (Roche Cobas) in samples obtained from 289 ambulatory participants demonstrated that the sensitivity of Ag-RDT with a supervised, self-collected anterior nasal swab sampling was 74.4% and specificity was 99.2%. The sensitivity with a professional-collected nasopharyngeal swab…
October 27, 2020
COVID-19 Serial Testing among Hospitalized Patients in a Midwest Tertiary Medical Center, July–September 2020
A serial COVID-19 testing program in an Iowa hospital found that out of 1,950 patients that had at least one repeat test during their admission, 19 (1%) converted from negative to positive. While the serial testing program allowed the hospital to detect seven infectious patients sooner and were able to prevent further in-hospital exposure events,…
October 26, 2020
Efficacy of hydroxychloroquine for post-exposure prophylaxis to prevent severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection: a blinded, randomized, controlled trial
[conference abstract, not peer-reviewed] Taking a two-week course of hydroxychloroquine did not prevent SARS-CoV-2 infection among household members of people with SARS-CoV-2 in a national, household-randomized trial in the US. Among participants who were SARS-CoV-2 negative at enrollment, there were 46 new infections among participants randomized to hydroxychloroquine (n=381) and 43 in the control participants…
October 23, 2020
Utilization and Results of Repeat SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR Testing in a Presumptive Low Prevalence Population
In a population of patients with a low prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 infection, repeat testing of negative patients who had persistent symptoms still yielded a negative result in 96% of the cases. Out of more than 5,000 patients who were tested, 4% of patients were tested more than once, and 96% of those patients were tested…
Tocilizumab in Nonventilated Patients Hospitalized with Covid-19 Pneumonia
[Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] The randomized, placebo-controlled multi-country EMPACTA trial indicated that tocilizumab reduced the likelihood of progression to requiring mechanical ventilation or death in patients who were hospitalized with COVID-19 pneumonia and were not on a ventilator (n=389). The cumulative proportion of patients requiring mechanical ventilation or who had died by day 28 was 12%…
Early Use of Nitazoxanide in Mild Covid-19 Disease Randomized Placebo-Controlled Trial
[Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] A multicenter, randomized, placebo-controlled trial of the antiparasitic drug nitazoxanide indicated that for patients with mild COVID-19, at 1-week follow-up, 78% of patients (n=194) who had received nitazoxanide and 57% who had received placebo (n=198) reported complete resolution of symptoms (p=0.048). Swabs collected were negative for SARS-CoV-2 in 30% of patients in…
Viral Dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 Infection and the Predictive Value of Repeat Testing
[Pre-print, not peer-reviewed] Prospective longitudinal testing for SARS-CoV-2 among players, staff, and vendors associated with the National Basketball Association (n=68) indicated that on average, individuals with symptomatic infection reached similar peak viral RNA concentrations to those with asymptomatic infection (cycle threshold 22.2 vs. 22.4) within similar amounts of time, but acute shedding lasted longer for…
Frequency and Duration of SARS-CoV-2 Shedding in Oral Fluid Samples Assessed by a Modified Commercial Rapid Molecular Assay
A study using the Simplexa COVID-19 Direct assays on oral fluid found that the assay had high sensitivity and specificity to detect SARS-CoV-2 RNA. Simplexa COVID-19 Direct is a rapid assay platform that does not require additional equipment. The assay was used to test oral fluids and nasopharyngeal swab specimens collected in parallel from 164…
October 22, 2020
Angiotensin Enzyme Inhibitors and Angiotensin Receptor Blockers as Protective Factors in COVID-19 Mortality: A Retrospective Cohort Study
Odds of mortality were reduced in half among participants taking angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors or angiotensin receptor blockers (95% CI = 0.3-0.7) in a retrospective cohort study (n=2,553) after adjusting for underlying conditions, length of stay, age, gender, and ICU admission. A notable confounder was the higher mortality frequency in patients with a history of underlying…
Efficacy of Tocilizumab in Patients Hospitalized with Covid-19
A randomized, placebo-controlled trial (n=243) demonstrated that tocilizumab (TCZ) was not effective in preventing intubation or death among moderately ill and hospitalized COVID-19 patients. At 28 days, the primary outcome of intubation or death was observed in 17 patients (10.6%) in the TCZ group and 10 patients (12.5%) in the placebo group (HR = 0.83,…
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