Sensitivity of Nasopharyngeal Swabs and Saliva for the Detection of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2
Alainna Jamal, Mohammad Mozafarihashjin, Eric A. Coomes, Jeff Powis, Angel X. Li, Aimee Paterson, Sofia Anceva-Sami, Shiva Barati, Gloria Crowl, Amna Faheem, Lubna Farooqi, Saman Khan, Karren Prost, Susan M. Poutanen, Maureen Taylor, Lily Yip, Xi Zhong, Allison McGeer, Samira Mubareka, Toronto Invasive Bacterial Diseases Network COVID-19 Investigators, Brenda L. Coleman, Danny Chen, Nataly Farshait, Wayne L. Gold, Christopher Kandel, Kevin Katz, Robert Kozak, Tony Mazzulli, Matthew Muller, Anne Opavsky, Mario Ostrowski, Agron Plevneshi, Neil Rau, Daniel Ricciuto, David Richardson, David Rose, Valérie Sales, Sharon Walmsley
Abstract
We enrolled 91 consecutive inpatients with COVID-19 at 6 hospitals in Toronto, Canada, and tested 1 nasopharyngeal swab/saliva sample pair from each patient using real-time RT-PCR for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. Sensitivity was 89% for nasopharyngeal swabs and 72% for saliva (P = .02). Difference in sensitivity was greatest for sample pairs collected later in illness.