• Debdutta Bhattacharya, Debaprasad Parai, Usha K Rout, Pujarini Dash, Rashmi R Nanda, Girish C Dash, Srikanta Kanungo, Subrata K Palo, Sidhartha Giri, Hari R Choudhary, Jaya S Kshatri, Jyotirmayee Turuk, Bijay K Mishra, Rajesh K Lenka, Saroj Dash, and Sanghamitra Pati.
• Department of Microbiology, ICMR-Regional Medical Research Centre (Dept. of Health Research, Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, Govt. of India), Bhubaneswar, India.
• J. Med. Virol. 2021 Apr 1; 93 (4): 2529-2533.

AbstractThere are very few studies in search of an alternate and convenient diagnostic tool which can substitute nasopharyngeal swab (NPS) specimen for detection of SARS-CoV-2. In the study we analyzed, the comparison and agreement between the feasibility of using the saliva in comparison to NPS for diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2. A total number of 74 patients were enrolled for this study. We analyzed and compared the NPS and saliva specimen collected within 48 h after the symptom onset. We carried out real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction, gene sequencing for the detection and determination SARS-CoV-2 specific genes. Phylogenetic tree was constructed to establish the isolation of viral RNA from saliva. We used the Bland-Altman model to identify the agreement between two specimens. This study showed a lower cycle threshold (CT ) mean value for the detection of SARS-CoV-2 ORF1 gene (mean, 27.07; 95% confidence interval [CI], 25.62 to 28.52) in saliva methods than that of NPS (mean 28.24; 95% CI, 26.62 to 29.85) specimen although the difference is statistically nonsignificant (p > .05). Bland-Altman analysis produced relatively smaller bias and high agreement between these two clinical specimens. Phylogenetic analysis with the RdRp and S gene confirmed the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in the saliva samples. Saliva represented a promising tool in COVID-19 diagnosis and the collection method would reduce the exposure risk of frontline health workers which is one of the major concerns in primary healthcare settings.© 2020 Wiley Periodicals LLC.

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