doi:?10

doi:?10.1093/cid/ciab048. of Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) in Korea issued by Korean Society for Laboratory Medicine (KSLM) and the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) that elaborate on the tests recommended for diagnosing COVID-19 [1]. This update includes recommendations for the rapid molecular test, antigen test, antibody test, and self-collected respiratory specimens, which were not covered in the previous guidelines, and a revision of the previous recommendations based on new scientific data (Table 1). Table 1 Types of COVID-19 laboratory tests in Korea thead th valign=”middle” align=”left” rowspan=”1″ colspan=”1″ Type of test /th th valign=”middle” align=”center” rowspan=”1″ colspan=”1″ Intended use /th th valign=”middle” align=”center” rowspan=”1″ colspan=”1″ Caution /th /thead rRT-PCRConfirmatory diagnosis in acute symptomatic patients or screening of GNA002 asymptomatic individualsNot suitable for quantitative interpretation. Infectivity cannot be determined on the basis of PCR results alone.Pooled test using rRT-PCRScreening of asymptomatic individualsSensitivity may vary with the transport medium, nucleic acid extraction method, and PCR reagent used, and the pool size.Rapid molecular testRapid screening under emergency situationsPositive results are recommended to be confirmed with a validated rRT-PCR.Antigen testDiagnosis for symptomatic patients within seven days from symptom onsetThe false-negative rate is high in pre-symptomatic or asymptomatic patients. The false-positive rate is high when prevalence is low.Antibody testConfirmation of past infection or multisystem GNA002 inflammation syndrome or serosurveillanceAssays with high specificity should be used. Not recommended for evaluating the risk of infection. Open in a separate window Abbreviation: rRT-PCR, real-time reverse transcription PCR. MOLECULAR TESTS KSLM and KDCA recommend real-time reverse transcription (rRT)-PCR as a molecular test for diagnosing COVID-19. In addition to rRT-PCR, there are various isothermal amplification methods, including loop-mediated isothermal amplification and clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats-based tests [2-7]. However, meta-analyses of these methods revealed insufficient performance or insufficient data; therefore, they should be used with caution in Korea at present [3-7]. Specimen types Nasopharyngeal and oropharyngeal swabs collected simultaneously and placed in the same transport medium are no longer recommended for routine use because of the high risk of droplet generation in the process of placing two swabs in the same transport medium and because the viral loads are similar between the two specimen types; nasopharyngeal swabs are sufficient [8]. The use of an inactivating agent-containing transport medium (e.g., a chaotropic agent) for molecular tests provides safer specimen handling [9, 10]. Self-collected respiratory specimens KSLM and KDCA generally do not recommend using self-collected respiratory specimens for diagnosing asymptomatic patients. Studies have investigated diagnosing COVID-19 using self-collected respiratory specimens, such as saliva, anterior nasal swabs (ANS), and mouthwash, as alternatives to nasopharyngeal GNA002 and oropharyngeal swabs [11-14]. The advantage of these specimens is that they are easily obtained. However, recent prospective studies have revealed that the test sensitivities for saliva and ANS in asymptomatic patients were significantly lower than those for nasopharyngeal swabs [15-19]. In addition, pooled tests using saliva or ANS have lower sensitivities than individual tests using saliva or ANS [20-23]. Therefore, collecting such specimens can Hexarelin Acetate be considered for patients who need repeated specimen collection or in whom nasopharyngeal swabs are difficult to collect. However, the possibility of false negatives should be carefully considered in advance [24, 25]. The possibility of viral transmission during the process of self-collection should also be considered. Test interpretation KSLM and KDCA recommend using a molecular test that targets two or more sites of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) genome and to consider a COVID-19 diagnostic test positive only when all targets are positive. If the initial test result is inconclusive in a patient with no history of confirmed COVID-19, collecting a new specimen for retesting is recommended. The following criteria apply only to the newly confirmed COVID-19 cases and in the course of treatment of a patient.

Posted in ??7-Dehydrocholesterol Reductase.