ISSN: 0973-7510

E-ISSN: 2581-690X

Research Article | Open Access
K. Vanathy1 , Raji Ramachandran Pillai1, Malarvizhi Ramalingam1, Agiesh Kumar Balakrishna Pillai2, G. Ezhumalai3 and Joshy Maducolil Easow1
1Department of Microbiology, Mahatma Gandhi Medical College & Research Institute (MGMCRI), Sri Balaji Vidyapeeth (Deemed to be University), Puducherry, India.
2Mahatma Gandhi Medical Advanced Research Institute (MGMARI), Sri Balaji Vidyapeeth (Deemed to be University), Puducherry, India.
3Sri Balaji Vidyapeeth (Deemed to be University), Puducherry, India.
Article Number: 9104 | © The Author(s). 2024
J Pure Appl Microbiol. 2024;18(1):460-466. https://doi.org/10.22207/JPAM.18.1.29
Received: 04 November 2023 | Accepted: 25 January 2024 | Published online: 28 February 2024
Issue online: March 2024
Abstract

Prompt diagnosis of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is requisite due to the upsurge of severe acute respiratory syndrome-coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) cases globally. Real-time reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (rRT-PCR) remains as the gold standard for the diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 due to its higher sensitivity and specificity. Regardless, due to its longer turnaround time and expertise, bed side testing rapid antigen based tests were developed in order for portable, rapid diagnosis of the disease. The present study delineates the utility of Rapid Antigen Testing (RAT) screening among symptomatic and asymptomatic patients in a tertiary care hospital. This is a retrospective data collection study from Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) portal by exporting the excel sheet from March 2021 to March 2022 who undergone COVID testing in a tertiary care diagnostics facility. The demographic and vaccination details of the individuals were extracted using ICMR Sample referral form (SRF) from all patients who are tested for RAT. Of the total 9898 patients tested for RAT, 392 and 9506 were vaccinated and unvaccinated, respectively. Among them, number of positives was 3% and 15% respectively. The odds ratio showed that the vaccinated individuals had 81.4% reduced risk of getting infection compared to unvaccinated individuals (OR-0.186; p=0.001). A significant difference was observed between the type of vaccine used and COVID infection, majority of them had taken Covishield (83.5%) followed by Covaxin (16%) [p=0.0005]. Males showed a marginally significant p trend with COVID infectivity (OR=1.114, p=0.073) too. RAT is useful as a screening test for rapid diagnosis of infection in patients who are more prone to spread the disease. As RAT is cost effective and had short-turnaround time, it can be recommended in areas with upsurge in SARS-CoV-2 cases to administer isolation and infection control measures.

Keywords

Rapid Antigen Test, Breakthrough Infections, COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, Vaccines

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© The Author(s) 2024. Open Access. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License which permits unrestricted use, sharing, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.