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Ok, so two days ago I started getting symptoms and found a testing site. I took the test today. I drove up and they put the swab on a table and I administered it myself.
I found another place that will do drive-thru testing but here as well you will administer the swab yourself.
Question: Why did they switch from a worker on site shoving the swab up your nose to you doing it yourself and why does the swab not have to go as far up as it did in comparison to the older tests?
I'm not a health care worker. I stuck it in as far as I could today, even more than they said to do, because I fear I wouldn't get a good sample.
Any info on the switch and if the new method of the less invasive self-swabbing is as accurate as the old tests would be much appreciated.
Ok, so two days ago I started getting symptoms and found a testing site. I took the test today. I drove up and they put the swab on a table and I administered it myself.
I found another place that will do drive-thru testing but here as well you will administer the swab yourself.
Question: Why did they switch from a worker on site shoving the swab up your nose to you doing it yourself and why does the swab not have to go as far up as it did in comparison to the older tests?
I'm not a health care worker. I stuck it in as far as I could today, even more than they said to do, because I fear I wouldn't get a good sample.
Any info on the switch and if the new method of the less invasive self-swabbing is as accurate as the old tests would be much appreciated.
Thanks.
Sounds very site-specific. Probably need to ask that facility. Could imagine lots of reasons. Maybe they started getting updated test kits from a different source. Maybe guidance suggests that having the subject handle the swabs is safer for their employees or requires using less PPE. Maybe they want to save potential discomfort by having the subject push the swab as far as is comfortable for them, not having someone else guess. Maybe newer versions of the test are more sensitive and don't need as much of a sample. Things are moving fast.
Last edited by Parnassia; 05-24-2020 at 01:12 PM..
Sounds very site-specific. Probably need to ask that facility. Could imagine lots of reasons. Maybe they started getting updated test kits from a different source. Maybe guidance suggests that having the subject handle the swabs is safer for their employees or requires using less PPE. Maybe they want to save potential discomfort by having the subject push the swab as far as is comfortable for them, not having someone else guess. Maybe newer versions of the test are more sensitive and don't need as much of a sample. Things are moving fast.
I did read one article where the impetus for coming up with the less evasive/self-swab test was to in fact, as you guessed, limit the usage of PPE.
I know back in March my brother had it done the "old way" and he said he cough and sneezed all over the guy who swabbed him. Immediately had to change his PPE.
I'm just worried that having us do it ourselves and not hitting our brains with the swab is going to be less accurate.
I'm not saying I want the pain and having a stranger shove that thing to my cerebral cortex but I want accuracy.
The 2nd place that I found doing the drive-thru testing did in fact switch from the old way to the new/less invasive way where you swab yourself.
I found an article by NPR from 6 days ago for those interested in this very topic. Keep stories coming and let me know if you guys find anything else out there.
I found an article by NPR from 6 days ago for those interested in this very topic. Keep stories coming and let me know if you guys find anything else out there.
This confirmed my suspicion that it was found later that the more invasive swab was not shown to be any more reliable than "shallower" self-swabbing (from your link):
When there's a new virus, Landon said guidelines always start out especially conservative. For example, doctors testing for COVID-19 used to collect multiple nose and throat swabs, but also blood and urine samples. As doctors learned more, that changed. They've since dropped the blood and urine samples. Now, federal guidelines allow for self-sampling and even at-home tests, which is why different testing sites administer different tests.
"It's an acknowledgement that there are practicalities," Landon said. "We may not need the redundancy we were having before, because now we're confident this one method is good enough."
How far back do you go?
As the federal government has adjusted who can administer a COVID-19 test, they've also changed how the test can be conducted. Previously, the preferred test was the nasopharyngeal test, which goes all the way to the back of the nose and is extremely uncomfortable. Doctors and researchers are finding that it's not always necessary to go back that far.
An early study by UnitedHealth out of Washington state found self-collected nasal swabs, even those that don't feel like a brain scrape, can be just as reliable as those particularly uncomfortable tests administered by health care workers. Another study by Rutgers University found testing saliva was also extremely reliable.
This confirmed my suspicion that it was found later that the more invasive swab was not shown to be any more reliable than "shallower" self-swabbing (from your link):
When there's a new virus, Landon said guidelines always start out especially conservative. For example, doctors testing for COVID-19 used to collect multiple nose and throat swabs, but also blood and urine samples. As doctors learned more, that changed. They've since dropped the blood and urine samples. Now, federal guidelines allow for self-sampling and even at-home tests, which is why different testing sites administer different tests.
"It's an acknowledgement that there are practicalities," Landon said. "We may not need the redundancy we were having before, because now we're confident this one method is good enough."
How far back do you go?
As the federal government has adjusted who can administer a COVID-19 test, they've also changed how the test can be conducted. Previously, the preferred test was the nasopharyngeal test, which goes all the way to the back of the nose and is extremely uncomfortable. Doctors and researchers are finding that it's not always necessary to go back that far.
An early study by UnitedHealth out of Washington state found self-collected nasal swabs, even those that don't feel like a brain scrape, can be just as reliable as those particularly uncomfortable tests administered by health care workers. Another study by Rutgers University found testing saliva was also extremely reliable.
I'm hoping that's the case. I swabbed myself this morning with a pharmacist watching. I wasn't shy about going far in but not being a doctor as well as a very anxious person it doesn't sit well with me that I had to administer it. Plus I know for a fact another person could go in deeper.
I contract out things I can do on my own to professionals all the time. I don't like the idea of not contracting out things I have no knowledge of.
Oh well. Results in 2-5 days.
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