TY  - JOUR
AU  - Soto, Raymond
AU  - Paul, Litty
AU  - Porucznik, Christina A
AU  - Xie, Heng
AU  - Stinnett, Rita Czako
AU  - Briggs, Benjamin
AU  - Biggerstaff, Matthew
AU  - Stanford, Joseph
AU  - Schlaberg, Robert
PY  - 2023
DA  - 2023/11/24
TI  - Effectiveness of Self-Collected, Ambient Temperature–Preserved Nasal Swabs Compared to Samples Collected by Trained Staff for Genotyping of Respiratory Viruses by Shotgun RNA Sequencing: Comparative Study
JO  - JMIR Form Res
SP  - e32848
VL  - 7
KW  - genotyping
KW  - self-collected nasal swabs
KW  - RNA sequencing
KW  - respiratory virus surveillance
KW  - surveillance
KW  - respiratory virus
KW  - influenza virus
KW  - pandemic
KW  - preparedness
KW  - testing capacity
KW  - self-test
KW  - viral genome analysis
KW  - swabs
KW  - barriers
KW  - early detection
KW  - nasal swab
KW  - temperature
KW  - public health
KW  - specimen
KW  - collection
KW  - diagnosis
KW  - laboratory
KW  - respiratory
KW  - virus
KW  - COVID-19
AB  - Background: The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has underscored the need for field specimen collection and transport to diagnostic and public health laboratories. Self-collected nasal swabs transported without dependency on a cold chain have the potential to remove critical barriers to testing, expand testing capacity, and reduce opportunities for exposure of health professionals in the context of a pandemic. Objective: We compared nasal swab collection by study participants from themselves and their children at home to collection by trained research staff. Methods: Each adult participant collected 1 nasal swab, sampling both nares with the single swab, after which they collected 1 nasal swab from 1 child. After all the participant samples were collected for the household, the research staff member collected a separate single duplicate sample from each individual. Immediately after the sample collection, the adult participants completed a questionnaire about the acceptability of the sampling procedures. Swabs were placed in temperature-stable preservative and respiratory viruses were detected by shotgun RNA sequencing, enabling viral genome analysis. Results: In total, 21 households participated in the study, each with 1 adult and 1 child, yielding 42 individuals with paired samples. Study participants reported that self-collection was acceptable. Agreement between identified respiratory viruses in both swabs by RNA sequencing demonstrated that adequate collection technique was achieved by brief instructions. Conclusions: Our results support the feasibility of a scalable and convenient means for the identification of respiratory viruses and implementation in pandemic preparedness for novel respiratory pathogens. 
SN  - 2561-326X
UR  - https://formative.jmir.org/2023/1/e32848
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2196/32848
UR  - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37999952
DO  - 10.2196/32848
ID  - info:doi/10.2196/32848
ER  -