October 2023—With respiratory virus season near, those with a close eye on it in August gave the lay of the land for test algorithms, technologies, and forecasts, even as SARS-CoV-2 and RSV cases were rising in parts of the country.
Read More »The who, what, and when of respiratory virus testing
November 2022—In mid-October, flu was picking up, with high levels of activity in Texas, Georgia, the District of Columbia, South Carolina, Tennessee, and New York. Elsewhere, it was still on the lower side, with less known about what was to come but plans in place. And questions, too, about laboratory testing as it relates to SARS-CoV-2, “which is going to be a challenge,” says David Peaper, MD, PhD, D(ABMM), a member of the CAP Microbiology Committee.
Read More »A wait-and-watch season of respiratory viruses
October 2022—Influenza incidence and what it will mean for testing in this respiratory virus season is a wild card, as is how SARS-CoV-2 will evolve. In early September, SARS-CoV-2 prevalence was declining in parts of the United States. “And if you believe in the theory of viral interference,” says Michelle Tabb, PhD, chief scientific officer at DiaSorin Molecular, “it’s leaving the door wide open right now for something else to step in. We’ll see if that’s RSV, or flu A, or if it’s a new COVID variant.”
Read More »Flu mounts COVID’s bustling stage
October 2020—Barely a half year into the pandemic’s presence in the United States, history has already begun pressing down on SARS-CoV-2 testing. Like an actor playing Hamlet, it’s been difficult not to feel the burden of past performances when preparing for the months ahead. Now, at the start of fall, that also means readying for the return of influenza. Here, even longer experience has shown that each new season is, indeed, a new season. As in the theater world itself these days, planning for what lies ahead feels tempest-tossed. Plans are being laid. Discussions continue. Creativity abounds, and hard work persists. The season shall unfold. But no one knows how it will look until the curtain—or whatever is passing for one this year—goes up. Poor Hamlet is troubled enough to fill the stage for hours—it is, in fact, Shakespeare’s longest play. Yet he’s just one man. Laboratories this fall are absorbing the slings and arrows of two roles simultaneously. Can they prepare for both parts (think Richard II and III sparring on the same stage) with confidence?
Read More »Uncharted season forges new paths for all hands
October 2020—Planning for respiratory season is always tricky but never more so than this year. “Uncharted territory for influenza” is how Frederick Nolte, PhD, D(ABMM), of the Medical University of South Carolina, describes the prospect of testing for influenza at the scale labs have been testing for SARS-CoV-2.
Read More »Oh, the places you’ll go when flu season hits
September 2020—The twinned challenge of testing for SARS-CoV-2 and the upcoming influenza season has a bit of The Cat in the Hat energy running through it. How does one manage to keep Thing One and Thing Two from creating unmitigated chaos? Maybe one doesn’t, not completely. A pandemic-based flu season will by its very nature be protean.
Read More »Labs size up options for unpredictable flu
December 2019—There aren’t good flu seasons; there are just varying degrees of how bad they are. That’s the message the CDC wants people to hear, says Lynnette Brammer, MPH, lead for the CDC’s domestic influenza surveillance team. It’s what laboratories know well and why platforms, panels, and prescribing patterns are top of mind.
Read More »Rapid PCR rules as labs ready flu arsenal
December 2018—With the memory of the 2017–2018 “high-severity” influenza season fresh in mind—49 million cases, 960,000 hospitalizations, a marginally effective vaccine, 79,000 deaths—clinical laboratories have been bracing for the customary annual surge in emergency room, outpatient clinic, and physician office influenza test orders. Although flu admissions have been rising somewhat, it is too soon to know how the season will play out, but laboratories are hoping for a season closer to average. Avoiding a repeat of last year’s travails—lengthy turnaround times, supply shortages, and the need to triage patients for testing—is a must, many laboratory directors say. “We had difficulty keeping up with last year’s demand. It was extremely time-consuming,” says Mary Kay O’Connor, national laboratory director at Summit Health Management, the management arm of the Summit Medical Group, an 800-provider practice on the East Coast.
Read More »Labs take stock of surprising flu season
March 2018—In a severe flu season that started early, laboratories faced unprecedented test volumes, used new testing platforms, and negotiated vendor supply shortages. When laboratory staff at Arkansas Children’s Hospital in Little Rock began seeing a rising number of requests for respiratory tests, and five positive flu results,
Read More »In flu season management, POC molecular to the fore
May 2017—Stacked against some of the nation’s previous bouts with influenza—such as the 2014–15 season—the 2016–17 flu season didn’t break records for drama. To be sure, every flu season is different, and regional variation was prominent. In Central Texas, some outbreaks appeared to start later than usual, but the dominant viruses were the same as last year’s—H1N1, H3N2, and influenza B—says Bob Fader, PhD, chief of the virology and microbiology laboratory at Baylor Scott & White Health, Temple, Tex. The strains identified were a good match with this year’s trivalent and quadrivalent vaccine. Testing volume was up, as were positive PCRs.
Read More »Who, what, when? Bringing order to influenza testing
November 2016—Raquel M. Martinez, PhD, D(ABMM), is very happy in her role as director of clinical and molecular microbiology at Geisinger Health System, Danville, Pa.
Read More »In late flu season, early signs of new tests’ impact
April 2016—The 2015–2016 influenza season is shaping up to be lighter than physician offices and hospitals have seen in recent years, with fewer flu positives reported, a lower death count, and a smaller share of flu-like illnesses among outpatients.
Read More »Flu view—tests, predictions for the upcoming season
October 2014—Whether exotic influenza viruses will surface this winter remains to be seen, but one thing is clear: The coming season will pack a punch in terms of promising diagnostics and forecasting models.
Read More »FDA, CDC, and tests steer flu Dx into new season
December 2013—What Soren Kierkegaard said about life applies just as well to flu seasons: They are understood backwards, but they have to be lived forwards. They’re not easy to forecast. And perhaps that’s one reason why the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has just announced a “Predict the Influenza Season Challenge,” offering $75,000 to the competitor who most successfully predicts the timing, peak, and intensity of the 2013–14 flu season using social media data.
Read More »Keeping an eye on H7N9, and learning from the past
June 2013—What began as a trickle of reports in China earlier this year swelled into a flood of patients with grave flu-like symptoms. Each time, PCR assays returned the same result: unsubtypable influenza A. Amid a rising mortality rate, viral samples were sent to China’s national laboratories for sequencing analyses. On March 31, Chinese officials posted the results to an open-access database and alerted the World Health Organization to a public health emergency of international concern: The H7N9 epidemic had begun.
Read More »Sizing up ‘mega’ multiplex panels for respiratory viruses
May 2013—During the flu season of 2012, patients crowded the emergency room at the University of North Carolina (UNC) Health Care’s Memorial Hospital. They presented with a cough. Congestion. Low-grade fever. In some cases, a sneeze. But in a matter of hours, their clinical pictures diverged: Some patients deteriorated, requiring hospitalization; others remained congested but stable.
Read More »Rx for optimizing rapid flu test performance
January 2013—With the arrival of another flu season—this one early and intense—rapid influenza diagnostic tests (RIDTs) are once again occupying many laboratory directors’ minds. But although laboratories have found RIDTs useful for the last decade, evaluations of the test kits’ performance have been limited to manufacturers’ product inserts and a few small-scale studies. Like swing shift and day shift workers in the hospital, RIDTs have not been brought together for an assessment side by side.
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