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Students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Scotland: a mixed methods study

OBJECTIVES: To explore the acceptability of regular asymptomatic testing for SARS-CoV-2 on a university campus using saliva sampling for PCR analysis and the barriers and facilitators to participation. DESIGN: Cross-sectional surveys and qualitative semistructured interviews. SETTING: Edinburgh, Sco...

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Autores principales: Bauld, Linda, Street, Alice, Connelly, Roxanne, Bevan, Imogen, Morlet Corti, Yazmin, Baxter, Mats Stage, Stagg, Helen R, Christison, Sarah, Mulherin, Tamara, Sinclair, Lesley, Aitman, Tim
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BMJ Publishing Group 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10030276/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36940944
http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2022-065021
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author Bauld, Linda
Street, Alice
Connelly, Roxanne
Bevan, Imogen
Morlet Corti, Yazmin
Baxter, Mats Stage
Stagg, Helen R
Christison, Sarah
Mulherin, Tamara
Sinclair, Lesley
Aitman, Tim
author_facet Bauld, Linda
Street, Alice
Connelly, Roxanne
Bevan, Imogen
Morlet Corti, Yazmin
Baxter, Mats Stage
Stagg, Helen R
Christison, Sarah
Mulherin, Tamara
Sinclair, Lesley
Aitman, Tim
author_sort Bauld, Linda
collection PubMed
description OBJECTIVES: To explore the acceptability of regular asymptomatic testing for SARS-CoV-2 on a university campus using saliva sampling for PCR analysis and the barriers and facilitators to participation. DESIGN: Cross-sectional surveys and qualitative semistructured interviews. SETTING: Edinburgh, Scotland. PARTICIPANTS: University staff and students who had registered for the testing programme (TestEd) and provided at least one sample. RESULTS: 522 participants completed a pilot survey in April 2021 and 1750 completed the main survey (November 2021). 48 staff and students who consented to be contacted for interview took part in the qualitative research. Participants were positive about their experience with TestEd with 94% describing it as ‘excellent’ or ‘good’. Facilitators to participation included multiple testing sites on campus, ease of providing saliva samples compared with nasopharyngeal swabs, perceived accuracy compared with lateral flow devices (LFDs) and reassurance of test availability while working or studying on campus. Barriers included concerns about privacy while testing, time to and methods of receiving results compared with LFDs and concerns about insufficient uptake in the university community. There was little evidence that the availability of testing on campus changed the behaviour of participants during a period when COVID-19 restrictions were in place. CONCLUSIONS: The provision of free asymptomatic testing for COVID-19 on a university campus was welcomed by participants and the use of saliva-based PCR testing was regarded as more comfortable and accurate than LFDs. Convenience is a key facilitator of participation in regular asymptomatic testing programmes. Availability of testing did not appear to undermine engagement with public health guidelines.
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spelling pubmed-100302762023-03-22 Students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Scotland: a mixed methods study Bauld, Linda Street, Alice Connelly, Roxanne Bevan, Imogen Morlet Corti, Yazmin Baxter, Mats Stage Stagg, Helen R Christison, Sarah Mulherin, Tamara Sinclair, Lesley Aitman, Tim BMJ Open Public Health OBJECTIVES: To explore the acceptability of regular asymptomatic testing for SARS-CoV-2 on a university campus using saliva sampling for PCR analysis and the barriers and facilitators to participation. DESIGN: Cross-sectional surveys and qualitative semistructured interviews. SETTING: Edinburgh, Scotland. PARTICIPANTS: University staff and students who had registered for the testing programme (TestEd) and provided at least one sample. RESULTS: 522 participants completed a pilot survey in April 2021 and 1750 completed the main survey (November 2021). 48 staff and students who consented to be contacted for interview took part in the qualitative research. Participants were positive about their experience with TestEd with 94% describing it as ‘excellent’ or ‘good’. Facilitators to participation included multiple testing sites on campus, ease of providing saliva samples compared with nasopharyngeal swabs, perceived accuracy compared with lateral flow devices (LFDs) and reassurance of test availability while working or studying on campus. Barriers included concerns about privacy while testing, time to and methods of receiving results compared with LFDs and concerns about insufficient uptake in the university community. There was little evidence that the availability of testing on campus changed the behaviour of participants during a period when COVID-19 restrictions were in place. CONCLUSIONS: The provision of free asymptomatic testing for COVID-19 on a university campus was welcomed by participants and the use of saliva-based PCR testing was regarded as more comfortable and accurate than LFDs. Convenience is a key facilitator of participation in regular asymptomatic testing programmes. Availability of testing did not appear to undermine engagement with public health guidelines. BMJ Publishing Group 2023-03-20 /pmc/articles/PMC10030276/ /pubmed/36940944 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2022-065021 Text en © Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2023. Re-use permitted under CC BY. Published by BMJ. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 Unported (CC BY 4.0) license, which permits others to copy, redistribute, remix, transform and build upon this work for any purpose, provided the original work is properly cited, a link to the licence is given, and indication of whether changes were made. See: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
spellingShingle Public Health
Bauld, Linda
Street, Alice
Connelly, Roxanne
Bevan, Imogen
Morlet Corti, Yazmin
Baxter, Mats Stage
Stagg, Helen R
Christison, Sarah
Mulherin, Tamara
Sinclair, Lesley
Aitman, Tim
Students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Scotland: a mixed methods study
title Students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Scotland: a mixed methods study
title_full Students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Scotland: a mixed methods study
title_fullStr Students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Scotland: a mixed methods study
title_full_unstemmed Students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Scotland: a mixed methods study
title_short Students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the COVID-19 pandemic in Scotland: a mixed methods study
title_sort students’ and staffs’ views and experiences of asymptomatic testing on a university campus during the covid-19 pandemic in scotland: a mixed methods study
topic Public Health
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10030276/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36940944
http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2022-065021
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