Assessment of the benefit of adding COVID-19 serology testing on admission to try and optimise the diagnosis of COVID-19 - serology test evaluation

On admission to hospital individuals with suspected COVID-19 will currently have swabs taken to check for the presence of COVID-19 viral RNA by a PCR test.  However, many individuals with presumed COVID-19 never have a positive PCR swab result which may be due to them having ceased shedding the virus by the time they are admitted to hospital. In these individuals, antibody tests may provide additional useful information to confirm their diagnosis.

For the currently available antibody tests it may be necessary to compare paired samples of blood to look for evidence of recent infection as a single blood sample may only be able to determine whether or not there has been evidence of past exposure.