Rapid Screening Evaluation of SARS-CoV-2 IgG Assays Using Z-Scores to Standardize Results

Emerg Infect Dis. 2020 Oct;26(10):2501-2503. doi: 10.3201/eid2610.202632. Epub 2020 Jul 29.

Abstract

Many serologic tests are now available for measuring severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 antibodies to evaluate potential protective immunity and for seroprevalence studies. We describe an approach to standardizing positivity thresholds and quantitative values for different assays that uses z-scores to enable rapid and efficient comparison of serologic test performance.

Keywords: COVID19; IgG; SARS-CoV-2; antibody; coronavirus; coronavirus disease; performance; qualitative results; quantitative results; respiratory infections; screening; serologic analysis; severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2; standardization; viruses; z-scores; zoonoses.

Publication types

  • Comparative Study
  • Letter
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Antibodies, Viral / blood*
  • Betacoronavirus / immunology*
  • COVID-19
  • COVID-19 Testing
  • Clinical Laboratory Techniques / methods*
  • Coronavirus Infections / blood
  • Coronavirus Infections / diagnosis*
  • Humans
  • Immunoglobulin G / blood*
  • Mass Screening / methods
  • Pandemics
  • Pneumonia, Viral / blood
  • Pneumonia, Viral / diagnosis*
  • Reproducibility of Results
  • SARS-CoV-2
  • Serologic Tests

Substances

  • Antibodies, Viral
  • Immunoglobulin G