Performance and feasibility of universal PCR admission screening for SARS‐CoV‐2 in a German tertiary care hospital
Please always quote using this URN: urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-238971
- Anamnestic screening of symptoms and contact history is applied to identify coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) patients on admission. However, asymptomatic and presymptomatic patients remain undetected although the viral load may be high. In this retrospective cohort study, all hospitalized patients who received polymerase chain reaction (PCR) admission testing from March 26th until May 24th, 2020 were included. Data on COVID‐19‐specific symptoms and contact history to COVID‐19 cases were retrospectively extracted from patient files and fromAnamnestic screening of symptoms and contact history is applied to identify coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) patients on admission. However, asymptomatic and presymptomatic patients remain undetected although the viral load may be high. In this retrospective cohort study, all hospitalized patients who received polymerase chain reaction (PCR) admission testing from March 26th until May 24th, 2020 were included. Data on COVID‐19‐specific symptoms and contact history to COVID‐19 cases were retrospectively extracted from patient files and from contact tracing notes. The compliance to the universal testing protocol was high with 90%. Out of 6940 tested patients, 27 new severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus‐2 infections (0.4%) were detected. Seven of those COVID‐19 cases (26% of all new cases) were asymptomatic and had no positive contact history, but were identified through a positive PCR test. The number needed to identify an asymptomatic patient was 425 in the first wave of the epidemic, 1218 in the low incidence phase. The specificity of the method was above 99.9%. Universal PCR testing was highly accepted by staff as demonstrated by high compliance. The costs to detect one asymptomatic case in future studies need to be traded off against the costs and damage caused by potential outbreaks of COVID‐19.…
Author: | Sören Krüger, Miriam Leskien, Patricia Schuller, Christiane Prifert, Benedikt Weißbrich, Ulrich Vogel, Manuel Krone |
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URN: | urn:nbn:de:bvb:20-opus-238971 |
Document Type: | Journal article |
Faculties: | Medizinische Fakultät / Institut für Hygiene und Mikrobiologie |
Medizinische Fakultät / Institut für Virologie und Immunbiologie | |
Language: | English |
Parent Title (English): | Journal of Medical Virology |
Year of Completion: | 2021 |
Volume: | 93 |
Issue: | 5 |
First Page: | 2890 |
Last Page: | 2898 |
Source: | Journal of Medical Virology 2021, 93(5):2890–2898. DOI: 10.1002/jmv.26770 |
DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1002/jmv.26770 |
Dewey Decimal Classification: | 6 Technik, Medizin, angewandte Wissenschaften / 61 Medizin und Gesundheit / 610 Medizin und Gesundheit |
Tag: | COVID‐19; SARS‐CoV‐2; admission screening; infection control; testing strategy |
Release Date: | 2021/12/16 |
Licence (German): | CC BY: Creative-Commons-Lizenz: Namensnennung 4.0 International |