Cargando…
Seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: Results of three hospitals in Serbia, prior to vaccine administration
BACKGROUND: Since the COVID-19 pandemic has started, Serbia has faced problems in implementing proper public health measures in the population, including non-pharmaceutical interventions, as well as protecting health care workers (HCWs) from disease, like all other countries. This study aimed to est...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , , |
---|---|
Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of King Saud Bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences.
2022
|
Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9130304/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35691217 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jiph.2022.05.009 |
_version_ | 1784712959405064192 |
---|---|
author | Markovic-Denic, Ljiljana Zdravkovic, Marija Ercegovac, Marko Djukic, Vladimir Nikolic, Vladimir Cujic, Danica Micic, Dusan Pekmezovic, Tatjana |
author_facet | Markovic-Denic, Ljiljana Zdravkovic, Marija Ercegovac, Marko Djukic, Vladimir Nikolic, Vladimir Cujic, Danica Micic, Dusan Pekmezovic, Tatjana |
author_sort | Markovic-Denic, Ljiljana |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: Since the COVID-19 pandemic has started, Serbia has faced problems in implementing proper public health measures in the population, including non-pharmaceutical interventions, as well as protecting health care workers (HCWs) from disease, like all other countries. This study aimed to estimate COVID-19 seroprevalence and evaluate the risk perception of COVID-19 among HCWs in three different hospitals in Belgrade, Serbia: non-COVID hospital, Emergency Center (EC), and dedicated COVID hospital. METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted in three hospitals during the second wave of the outbreak in Serbia, from June to early October. All staff in these hospitals were invited to voluntarily participate in blood sampling for IgG antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 and questionnaire testing. The questionnaire included socio-demographic characteristics, known exposure to COVID-19 positive persons, previous signs and symptoms related to COVID-19 infection since the outbreak had started in our country, and SARS-CoV-2 PCR testing. RESULTS: The overall prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibody among 1580 HCWs was 18.3 % [95 % CI 16.4–20.3 %]. Significantly higher prevalence of HCWs with positive results for the serum IgG antibody test was observed in COVID hospital (28.6 %, 95 %CI: 24.0–33.6 %) vs. prevalence in the EC (12.6 %, 95 %CI: 10.1–15.4 %), and in the non-COVID hospital (18.3 %, 95 %CI: 15.2–26.7 %). The prevalence adjusted for declared test sensitivity and specificity would be 16.8 %; that is 27.4 % in COVID-19 hospital, 10.9 % in EC, and 16.8 % in non-COVID hospital. In multivariate logistic regression analysis, the independent predictors for seropositivity were working in COVID-hospital, the profession of physician, and the presence of the following symptoms: fever, shortness of breath, and anosmia/ageusia. CONCLUSIONS: We found an overall seropositivity rate of 18.3 % and 16.0 % of the adjusted rate that is higher than seroprevalence obtained in similar studies conducted before vaccinations started. The possibility that patients in non-COVID dedicated hospitals might also be infectious, although PCR tested, imposes the need for the use of personal protective equipment also in non-COVID medical institutions. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-9130304 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2022 |
publisher | The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of King Saud Bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-91303042022-05-25 Seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: Results of three hospitals in Serbia, prior to vaccine administration Markovic-Denic, Ljiljana Zdravkovic, Marija Ercegovac, Marko Djukic, Vladimir Nikolic, Vladimir Cujic, Danica Micic, Dusan Pekmezovic, Tatjana J Infect Public Health Original Article BACKGROUND: Since the COVID-19 pandemic has started, Serbia has faced problems in implementing proper public health measures in the population, including non-pharmaceutical interventions, as well as protecting health care workers (HCWs) from disease, like all other countries. This study aimed to estimate COVID-19 seroprevalence and evaluate the risk perception of COVID-19 among HCWs in three different hospitals in Belgrade, Serbia: non-COVID hospital, Emergency Center (EC), and dedicated COVID hospital. METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted in three hospitals during the second wave of the outbreak in Serbia, from June to early October. All staff in these hospitals were invited to voluntarily participate in blood sampling for IgG antibodies against SARS-CoV-2 and questionnaire testing. The questionnaire included socio-demographic characteristics, known exposure to COVID-19 positive persons, previous signs and symptoms related to COVID-19 infection since the outbreak had started in our country, and SARS-CoV-2 PCR testing. RESULTS: The overall prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibody among 1580 HCWs was 18.3 % [95 % CI 16.4–20.3 %]. Significantly higher prevalence of HCWs with positive results for the serum IgG antibody test was observed in COVID hospital (28.6 %, 95 %CI: 24.0–33.6 %) vs. prevalence in the EC (12.6 %, 95 %CI: 10.1–15.4 %), and in the non-COVID hospital (18.3 %, 95 %CI: 15.2–26.7 %). The prevalence adjusted for declared test sensitivity and specificity would be 16.8 %; that is 27.4 % in COVID-19 hospital, 10.9 % in EC, and 16.8 % in non-COVID hospital. In multivariate logistic regression analysis, the independent predictors for seropositivity were working in COVID-hospital, the profession of physician, and the presence of the following symptoms: fever, shortness of breath, and anosmia/ageusia. CONCLUSIONS: We found an overall seropositivity rate of 18.3 % and 16.0 % of the adjusted rate that is higher than seroprevalence obtained in similar studies conducted before vaccinations started. The possibility that patients in non-COVID dedicated hospitals might also be infectious, although PCR tested, imposes the need for the use of personal protective equipment also in non-COVID medical institutions. The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of King Saud Bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences. 2022-07 2022-05-25 /pmc/articles/PMC9130304/ /pubmed/35691217 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jiph.2022.05.009 Text en © 2022 The Authors Since January 2020 Elsevier has created a COVID-19 resource centre with free information in English and Mandarin on the novel coronavirus COVID-19. The COVID-19 resource centre is hosted on Elsevier Connect, the company's public news and information website. Elsevier hereby grants permission to make all its COVID-19-related research that is available on the COVID-19 resource centre - including this research content - immediately available in PubMed Central and other publicly funded repositories, such as the WHO COVID database with rights for unrestricted research re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active. |
spellingShingle | Original Article Markovic-Denic, Ljiljana Zdravkovic, Marija Ercegovac, Marko Djukic, Vladimir Nikolic, Vladimir Cujic, Danica Micic, Dusan Pekmezovic, Tatjana Seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: Results of three hospitals in Serbia, prior to vaccine administration |
title | Seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: Results of three hospitals in Serbia, prior to vaccine administration |
title_full | Seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: Results of three hospitals in Serbia, prior to vaccine administration |
title_fullStr | Seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: Results of three hospitals in Serbia, prior to vaccine administration |
title_full_unstemmed | Seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: Results of three hospitals in Serbia, prior to vaccine administration |
title_short | Seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: Results of three hospitals in Serbia, prior to vaccine administration |
title_sort | seroprevalence in health care workers during the later phase of the second wave: results of three hospitals in serbia, prior to vaccine administration |
topic | Original Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9130304/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35691217 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jiph.2022.05.009 |
work_keys_str_mv | AT markovicdenicljiljana seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration AT zdravkovicmarija seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration AT ercegovacmarko seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration AT djukicvladimir seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration AT nikolicvladimir seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration AT cujicdanica seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration AT micicdusan seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration AT pekmezovictatjana seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration AT seroprevalenceinhealthcareworkersduringthelaterphaseofthesecondwaveresultsofthreehospitalsinserbiapriortovaccineadministration |