Swabbing

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I'm not sure if this has been posted before, if so please excuse the repeat. A neighbor of mine became ill and began using a home kit to determine if he had Covid. Two tests later he was showing negative. He got a call in with his family doctor who asked how he was administering the test. He said he was swabbing both nostrils. The doctor said that with Omicron he needed to swab both side of his throat along with both nostrils. He tested positive. A few hours later he tested again, positive. I bring this up because I have told this to a number of people who had not heard about swabbing the throat.
 
Well, my official source, Google, came up with that a throat swab is best done by a trained professional. The same article indicates that home tests may not be the best to detect Omicron.
 
JEK said:
Well, my official source, Google, came up with that a throat swab is best done by a trained professional. The same article indicates that home tests may not be the best to detect Omicron.
Click to expand...

Good luck with getting a trained professional, lines are a mile long for rapid tests alone. If one can test at home it's good to know you need to swab the throat along with the nostrils.
 
I’ll post this article in the clear as my link might have been too subtle.

FDA Issues Guidance Amid Throat Swab Debate: ‘Tests Should Be Used as Authorized'

Published 1 hour ago • Updated 1 hour ago
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NBCUniversal Media, LLCWith a soaring number of COVID cases and testing sites seeing high demand, at-home tests have often become the more convenient option.

With many patients reporting sore throats in omicron COVID cases, a debate over whether or not to add throat swabs to testing methods has sparked, but the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has cautioned that such advice could be dangerous in some cases.
Federal guidance has not changed on how to test for COVID, and all test kits have specific FDA-approved instructions on how they should be used, but some medical professionals are debating whether adding a throat swab, in addition to nasal swabbing, could lead to more accurate test results.
The FDA noted safety concerns with such advice, particularly for at-home tests.
"The FDA advises that COVID-19 tests should be used as authorized, including following their instructions for use regarding obtaining the sample for testing," the agency said in a statement provided to NBC 5 Wednesday.



According to the FDA's testing guidance, which was last updated in December, "different tests are authorized to be used with different types of samples," but the most common sample types include nasal or throat swabs and saliva samples.
The FDA warned, however, of potential safety concerns for self-collection of throat swabs "as they are more complicated than nasal swabs - and if used incorrectly, can cause harm to the patient." The agency added that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends throat swabs be collected by a trained health care provider.

Dr. Michael Daignault, an ER physician and Chief Medical Advisor for Reliant Health Services, told NBC 5 Tuesday he has seen "some cases where people who do the regular nasal swab test negative."
"But then I've had some doctor friends who started swabbing the backs of throats, and they're finding that's positive," he said.
Some doctors, including Dr. Anthony Fauci, White House chief medical advisor and the top U.S. infectious disease expert, have cautioned that not all at-home antigen tests may be able to adequately detect the omicron variant.
It's a message Illinois' top doctor, Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike, echoed last month.
"There are some commercially available tests that won't detect omicron," she said. "But we have to remember that those rapid antigen test, they're not 100%. So if you have symptoms and have a negative test I would still be very cautious."
Preliminary research by the the FDA, in collaboration with the National Institutes of Health's Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics program, found that rapid antigen tests may be less sensitive at detecting the highly contagious omicron variant and could lead to results that are "false negative."
The research used samples from patients confirmed to be infected with the omicron strain of the virus to study the performance of at-home tests, also known as "antigen" tests.
The agency said early data suggests that antigen tests "do detect the omicron variant but may have reduced sensitivity," meaning it's possible such tests could miss an infection.
Rapid antigen tests, which work by detecting surface proteins of the coronavirus, are relatively inexpensive and quick, with results known in around 15 minutes. They can, however, miss the early stages of COVID-19 infection. Most popular at-home tests advise users to take two tests on separate days to ensure more accurate results.
But Daignault said he believes some of the common symptoms with omicron could play a role.
"I think that's because the omicron variant, we've seen that it's causing sore throat and nasal congestion, and so if you miss a good sample from the nose and you swab the back of your throat, it increases the accuracy of the test," he said.
Daignault noted that such swabs would need to be taken using the same test.
The recommendation echoes a recent social media trend on Twitter referred to as #SwabYourThroat, which saw users, including a University College London biologist, reporting negative nasal swab tests, but positive results after adding a throat swab.

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JEK said:
‘Tests Should Be Used as Authorized'
Click to expand...

100% this! I know way less than any medical person but way more than I care to about this as we are doing a ton of testing in our schools.

Throat swabs should not be self administered but may be better for detecting Omicron, especially during early infection.

As the article says, if you have symptoms or confirmed exposure and test negative with a rapid, test again the next day.

For the nasal swab, don't just do the lower nasal passage, get to where the bone is.
 
marybeth said:
100% this! I know way less than any medical person but way more than I care to about this as we are doing a ton of testing in our schools.

Throat swabs should not be self administered but may be better for detecting Omicron, especially during early infection.

As the article says, if you have symptoms or confirmed exposure and test negative with a rapid, test again the next day.

For the nasal swab, don't just do the lower nasal passage, get to where the bone is.
Click to expand...

As usual, things are changing daily, this just 6 days ago, looks good to do together at home.

https://slate.com/technology/2021/12/throat-swab-rapid-testing-omicron-effective.html
 
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