A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF DIAGNOSTIC ACCURACY OF A POINT-OF-CARE SCREENING TEST VIS-À-VIS A GOLD STANDARD TEST FOR DIAGNOSIS OF COVID-19 IN CASES OF SURGICAL EMERGENCIES

Abstract

In this COVID – 19 pandemic, there's an urgent need for a sensitive and specic test which provides results in a short span of time. Rapid Antigen Tests, have the potential to replace RT-PCR tests as a conrmatory test. A comparative study of Point-of-Care test vis-à-vis gold standard test was carried out by the Surgical Department of a secondary level care hospital. A total of 112 patients, with various surgical emergencies were tested, by RADT and by RT-PCR for conrmation. Patients were managed based on RADT results as per the institutional algorithm. 107 RADTs tested negative while ve tested positive. 105 RT-PCR tested negative while seven tested positive. Two patients reported negative by RADT were reported as RT-PCR positive. Although RADTs have the potential, their sensitivity is highly variable. To establish them as diagnostic tests of choice, RADTs need to be developed further so as to ensure that their sensitivity is high and results are reproducible across multiple centers.