Self-Diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 from Saliva Samples at Home: Isothermal Amplification Enabled by Do-It-Yourself Portable Incubators and Laminated Poly-ethyl Sulfonate Membranes

COVID-19 made explicit the need for rethinking the way in which we conduct testing for epidemic emergencies. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the dependence on centralized lab facilities and resource-intensive methodologies (e.g., RT-qPCR methods) greatly limited the deployment of widespread testing ef...

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Published inDiagnostics (Basel) Vol. 14; no. 2; p. 221
Main Authors Bravo-González, Sergio, González-González, Everardo, Perales-Salinas, Valeria, Rodríguez-Sánchez, Iram Pablo, Ortiz-Castillo, Jose E, Vargas-Martínez, Adriana, Perez-Gonzalez, Victor H, Luna-Aguirre, Claudia Maribel, Trujillo-de Santiago, Grissel, Alvarez, Mario Moisés
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Switzerland MDPI AG 01.01.2024
Subjects
COVID-19
COVID-19 diagnostic tests
diagnostic
Ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid
Health aspects
Infectious diseases
isothermal nucleic acid amplification
Pandemics
portable
Proprietary
Reagents
saliva
SARS-CoV-2
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2
Silicones
Mexico
China
England
United Kingdom > UK
United States > US
COVID-19
saliva
SARS-CoV-2
LAMP
diagnostic
portable
extraction free
at home
isothermal nucleic acid amplification
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Summary:COVID-19 made explicit the need for rethinking the way in which we conduct testing for epidemic emergencies. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the dependence on centralized lab facilities and resource-intensive methodologies (e.g., RT-qPCR methods) greatly limited the deployment of widespread testing efforts in many developed and underdeveloped countries. Here, we illustrate the development of a simple and portable diagnostic kit that enables self-diagnosis of COVID-19 at home from saliva samples. We describe the development of a do-it-yourself (DIY) incubator for Eppendorf tubes that can be used to conduct SARS-CoV-2 detection with competitive sensitivity and selectivity from saliva at home. In a proof-of-concept experiment, we assembled Eppendorf-tube incubators at our home shop, prepared a single-tube mix of reagents and LAMP primers in our lab, and deployed these COVID-19 detection kits using urban delivery systems (i.e., Rappifavor or Uber) to more than 15 different locations in Monterrey, México. This straightforward strategy enabled rapid and cost-effective at-home molecular diagnostics of SARS-CoV-2 from real saliva samples with a high sensitivity (100%) and high selectivity (87%).
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ISSN:2075-4418
2075-4418
DOI:10.3390/diagnostics14020221