Journal
HEAD AND NECK-JOURNAL FOR THE SCIENCES AND SPECIALTIES OF THE HEAD AND NECK
Volume 42, Issue 7, Pages 1621-1628Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1002/hed.26317
Keywords
COVID-19; head and neck surgery; pandemic; preoperative testing; RT-PCR
Categories
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Background No reports describe falsepositive reverse transcriptase polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) for novel coronavirus in preoperative screening. Methods Preoperative patients had one or two nasopharyngeal swabs, depending on low or high risk of viral transmission. Positive tests were repeated. Results Forty-three of 52 patients required two or more preoperative tests. Four (9.3%) had discrepant results (positive/negative). One of these left the coronavirus disease (COVID) unit against medical advice despite an orbital abscess, with unknown true disease status. The remaining 3 of 42 (7.1%) had negative repeat RT-PCR. Although ultimately considered falsepositives, one was sent to a COVID unit postoperatively and two had urgent surgery delayed. Assuming negative repeat RT-PCR, clear chest imaging, and lack of subsequent symptoms represent the gold standard, RT-PCR specificity was 0.97. Conclusions If false positives are suspected, we recommend computed tomography (CT) of the chest and repeat RT-PCR. Validated serum immunoglobulin testing may ultimately prove useful.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available