Antibody testing thread 2

[Egghead68]

Thread for people thinking about, doing, or awaiting results of COVID-19 antibody tests.

I got a negative from the Abbott home test via ZoomDoc. Symptoms were a weird “cold” that progressed over three weeks from exhaustion to sore throat to tight chest and tickly cough. I still think it could’ve been Covid but mild enough to not trigger the antibody production. Guess I’ll never know!

Feeling quite down having just received my negative result this evening. I was very ill in March with Covid symtoms then pneumonia, though I was treated at home and never admitted to hospital. Have had weird symptoms since and was really looking for some reassurance that I wasn’t imagining it all

@Whatapickle I felt the same a bit with my negative result. You can feel like a fraud or nutter and that people will think you have been making it up. However the reality is that there are false negatives because different people have different immune responses and we don’t all produce measurable and lasting amounts of IgG.

Thank you - that does make sense. Hopefully we will understand more about this horrible illness over the coming months...x

According to different studies I've read between 30 and 80% of people who've had Covid had no symptoms.

Radio 4 More or Less has an article about antibody testing now. They are sceptical about the accuracy!

“There’s a lot of spin in the way the manufacturers are presenting the results to the public”

“As a statistician this makes my blood pressure go up”

They emphasised that POSITIVE antibody test results are very rarely wrong, I.e. the test is highly specific (but not very sensitive).

I was really surprised my DH's result was positive. I m getting tested at the weekend.

It seems to be hard to predict who’s going to be positive and who negative.

The lab which tested me said that two possible reasons for a negative C19 test (other than not having had it , or a faulty test) are that one failed to mount a sufficient immune response and therefore igG levels are undetectable, or that one had a weak igG response and the level of igG has already declined.

They also note that there are still a number of unanswered questions about just how an individual responds to C19.

That seems a fair summary of the position to me.

Just got my negative result. I had symptoms in February, so I wonder if it's just too long ago to detect (Abbott test). Or I had something else entirely!

Good summary I think @onlinelinda.

@Watsername Was the test one that you post back?

Hooefully you can get one from the G.P soon.

I've got my antibody test on Sunday. Am very anxious about how I'll feel if negative I almost dont want the test now...it seems there are a lot of mixed results here which isn't great..sorry to everyone that's been unwell. I've been really unwell since beginning of March, assumed to be covid, still very breathless and have bad chest pain, on high dose steroids etc,

@tanglyderm, if you're on oral steroids you may be immunosuppresed, which might result on a false negative (according to Public Health England data).

See the bullet points:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachmentdata/file/890566/EvaluationnofAbbotttSARSCoVV2IgGGPHE.pdf

People might find this helpful. The BBC tonight says that by the time UK went into lockdown on 23 July we had 100, 000 new cases of covid a day and it was doubling every 3-4 days.

In my case, it adds to my feeling that I did have it, as I was first infected just a few days previously-exactly when there was a ton of new cases.

Coronavirus: 'Earlier lockdown would have halved death toll' www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-52995064

NHS here. Tested negative and I was gutted. I really thought Id had some form of it in March. On my ward so far one is positive who had no symptons. Another positive whos husband works in ITU and is also positive. The other nurses have been negative so far.

Just posting on here as a bit dumbfounded with some news today.

DH was ill mid March with classic symptoms. GP friend had some antibody tests a couple of week (not sure which ones but not the approved ones as rate of false negative too high). We did them, DH positive which was no surprise, me negative which was a bit annoying as I thought I'd had mild symptoms (which were probably anxiety looking back).

However, DM and her partner have both just had NHS tests through work and both got positive results.

The thing is, they were ill over Christmas and new year with what we now know are classic symptoms - DM's partner very ill over Christmas, which went on for months finally leading to a pleurisy diagnosis early March, he's been shielding since then and still has breathing problems now. DM was ill over new year for about 3 weeks but fine now.

Obviously at the time we hadn't even heard of covid, since then DM has been convinced she had it which we poo pooed as too early - but seems she was right! Unless they somehow were very ill with all the symptoms and it was something else, but then got symptomless covid after?

If we assume they did have it over Christmas - surely a large proportion of the population must have been exposed already? They hadn't travelled beforehand so no reason to think they would have been more at risk.

@LittlePickleHead

Just posting on here as a bit dumbfounded with some news today.

DH was ill mid March with classic symptoms. GP friend had some antibody tests a couple of week (not sure which ones but not the approved ones as rate of false negative too high). We did them, DH positive which was no surprise, me negative which was a bit annoying as I thought I'd had mild symptoms (which were probably anxiety looking back).

However, DM and her partner have both just had NHS tests through work and both got positive results.

The thing is, they were ill over Christmas and new year with what we now know are classic symptoms - DM's partner very ill over Christmas, which went on for months finally leading to a pleurisy diagnosis early March, he's been shielding since then and still has breathing problems now. DM was ill over new year for about 3 weeks but fine now.

Obviously at the time we hadn't even heard of covid, since then DM has been convinced she had it which we poo pooed as too early - but seems she was right! Unless they somehow were very ill with all the symptoms and it was something else, but then got symptomless covid after?

If we assume they did have it over Christmas - surely a large proportion of the population must have been exposed already? They hadn't travelled beforehand so no reason to think they would have been more at risk.

It possibly could have been covid but we wont know until we find out exactly when it started spreading and for how long antibodies last if you produce them.

There's all sorts of bugs circulating during winter so it may have been a community acquired pneumonia/ pleurisy. They could have been asymptomatic with COVID earlier this year for all we know. I went to Italy early in December then came down with a cold that left me a bit breathless and tachycardia. I did think what if it was COVID but I probably caught it from colleagues that went down with it.

Here’s the More or Less episode that talks about the accuracy of antibody tests:

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000jw02

Interesting post about oral steroids - thanks @onlinelinda

@onlinelinda Thanks that's helpful. I think I'll go ahead with the test anyway but its definitely helpful to know I might get a false negative so I can prepare for that!

I've just had blood drawn for a blue horizon test. I was ill at the beginning of March, cough, mild shortness of breath after about a week, sweats, congestion, sore throat, complete loss of sense of smell even after using decongestants.

Will update when I get the results!

I'm thinking to go along to Blue Horizon's. How long for results once blood is taken Utini?

The kit said a 1-2 working day turnaround time once it's received by the lab, so should be pretty fast.

The return postage was royal mail 24 hours, so I guess they'll get mine tomorrow, but no idea if the lab runs over the weekend.