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. 2022 Oct;74(Suppl 2):3126-3130.
doi: 10.1007/s12070-021-02849-6. Epub 2021 Sep 15.

Covid 19 Pandemic-Training of Healthcare Workers in Obtaining a Nasopharyngeal Swab: Our Experience

Suma Susan Mathews  1 , Lalee Varghese  1 , M C Trupthi  1 , Nancy Naomi  2 , Ajoy Mathew Varghese  1
Affiliations

Covid 19 Pandemic-Training of Healthcare Workers in Obtaining a Nasopharyngeal Swab: Our Experience

Suma Susan Mathews et al. Indian J Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg. 2022 Oct.

Abstract

To describe the training of healthcare workers (HCW) in nasopharyngeal swabbing during the COVID 19 pandemic.

Study design: Retrospective study.

Setting: Tertiary care teaching hospital.

Subjects and methods: One hundred and seventy eight health care workers were trained from May 2020 to January 2021. Three modules were designed to train the health care workers in the technique of obtaining a nasopharyngeal swab specimen.Training consisted of an instructional video on how to perform nasopharyngeal swabs and live demonstration followed by hands-on supervised training. The trainees included 30 doctors, 101 nurses, 31 respiratory therapists, 3 physiotherapists, 9 interns and 4 lab technicians. There were 39 male and 139 female trainees. After attending all 3 modules of training, they were confident and efficient in taking a non-traumatic nasopharyngeal swab. Good knowledge and adequate training is key to a good nasopharyngeal sampling for SARS CoV-2 testing.

Keywords: COVID 19 pandemic; Health care worker; Nasopharyngeal swab; SARS CoV-2.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflict of interestThe authors have no conflict of interest to disclose in this work.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Demonstration on mannequin
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Bedside training
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Fig. 3
Swabbing kiosk
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Fig. 4
Plaster of Paris nose model for hands on training
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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