Due to necessary scheduled maintenance, the JMIR Publications website will be unavailable from Wednesday, July 01, 2020 at 8:00 PM to 10:00 PM EST. We apologize in advance for any inconvenience this may cause you.
Who will be affected?
Readers: No access to all 28 journals. We recommend accessing our articles via PubMed Central
Authors: No access to the submission form or your user account.
Reviewers: No access to your user account. Please download manuscripts you are reviewing for offline reading before Wednesday, July 01, 2020 at 7:00 PM.
Editors: No access to your user account to assign reviewers or make decisions.
Copyeditors: No access to user account. Please download manuscripts you are copyediting before Wednesday, July 01, 2020 at 7:00 PM.
Herbert C, Kheterpal V, Suvarna T, Broach J, Marquez J, Gerber B, Schrader S, Nowak C, Harman E, Heetderks W, Fahey N, Orvek E, Lazar P, Ferranto J, Noorishirazi K, Valpady S, Shi Q, Lin H, Marvel K, Gibson L, Barton B, Lemon S, Hafer N, McManus D, Soni A
Design and Preliminary Findings of Adherence to the Self-Testing for Our Protection From COVID-19 (STOP COVID-19) Risk-Based Testing Protocol: Prospective Digital Study
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Design and Preliminary Findings from Self-Testing for Our Protection from COVID-19 (STOP COVID-19): a prospective digital study of adherence to a risk-based testing protocol
Carly Herbert;
Vik Kheterpal;
Thejas Suvarna;
John Broach;
Juan Marquez;
Ben Gerber;
Summer Schrader;
Chris Nowak;
Emma Harman;
William Heetderks;
Nisha Fahey;
Elizabeth Orvek;
Peter Lazar;
Julia Ferranto;
Kamran Noorishirazi;
Shivakumar Valpady;
Qiming Shi;
Honghuang Lin;
Kathryn Marvel;
Laura Gibson;
Bruce Barton;
Stephenie Lemon;
Nathaniel Hafer;
David McManus;
Apurv Soni
ABSTRACT
Background:
Serial testing for SARS-CoV-2 is recommended to reduce spread of the virus; however, little is known about adherence to recommended testing schedules and reporting practices to health departments.
Objective:
Self-Testing for Our Protection from COVID-19 (STOP COVID-19) aims to examine adherence to a risk-based COVID-19 testing strategy using rapid antigen tests and reporting of test results to health departments.
Methods:
STOP COVID-19 is a 12-week digital study, facilitated using a smartphone application for testing assistance and reporting. We are recruiting 20,000 participants throughout the United States. Participants are stratified into high- and low-risk groups based on history of COVID-19 infection and vaccination status. High-risk participants are instructed to perform twice-weekly testing for COVID-19 using rapid antigen tests, while low-risk participants test only in the case of symptoms or exposure to COVID-19. All participants complete COVID-19 surveillance surveys, and rapid antigen results are recorded within the smartphone application. Primary outcomes include participant adherence to a risk-based serial testing protocol and percentage of rapid tests reported to health departments.
Results:
As of February 2022, 3,496 participants have enrolled, including 1,083 high-risk participants. Participants have reported 98.2% (95% Confidence Interval (CI): 97.9-98.4) of their test results to public health departments with full personal identifying information or anonymously. Among 622 high-risk participants who finished the study period, 35.9% showed high adherence to the study testing protocol. Participants with high adherence reported a higher percentage of test results to the Department of Health with full identifying information than those in the moderate or low adherence groups (High: 71.7% [95% CI: 70.3-73.1]; Moderate: 68.3% [95% CI: 66.0-70.5]; Low: 63.1% [59.5-66.6]).
Conclusions:
Preliminary results from the STOP COVID-19 provide important insights into rapid antigen test reporting and usage and can inform the use of rapid testing interventions for COVID-19 surveillance.
Citation
Please cite as:
Herbert C, Kheterpal V, Suvarna T, Broach J, Marquez J, Gerber B, Schrader S, Nowak C, Harman E, Heetderks W, Fahey N, Orvek E, Lazar P, Ferranto J, Noorishirazi K, Valpady S, Shi Q, Lin H, Marvel K, Gibson L, Barton B, Lemon S, Hafer N, McManus D, Soni A
Design and Preliminary Findings of Adherence to the Self-Testing for Our Protection From COVID-19 (STOP COVID-19) Risk-Based Testing Protocol: Prospective Digital Study