Just tested positive by chance after cold symptoms

[oep17]

Was given lateral flow kit on Thursday (work in NHS) but wasn’t going to start using it until after Xmas as I am on leave until January. When all plans got cancelled this afternoon thought I may as well do one as if by some chance it’s positive then we are isolating now anyway (tier 4 area). I’ve had nothing more than what in any other year I would say is a cold since Monday (14th) with blocked nose and sinusitis. Also had terrible backache with aching legs on the Monday which I thought was caused by carrying too much heavy shopping.

Lo and behold my lateral flow test was a beaming positive. I’ve had no fever, no cough and no loss of taste or smell. I would not have otherwise been eligible for the general NHS test as don’t have any of those symptoms so if I hadn’t taken the lateral flow I would never have known.

When will my contacts be traced from and the 10 day isolation started? Today or when I first got the cold symptoms?

I am very stressed and also 15 weeks pregnant. If I’m 6 days into symptoms and no one I have had contact with is showing any symptoms how likely is it that I have passed it on? We only came out of a 2 week isolation as my DS had a positive contact at nursery 9 days ago. He’s not been back since. Could it be delayed from that?

I can’t sleep as I found out late this evening and it’s sending me mad with worry. We have a confirmatory PCR NHS test booked at 7.30am but have to drive an hour to get it as that’s all the availability they had.

@oep17

Test all done and handed over. Test centre was quite busy and the biohazard box was full of tests when we handed ours over at only 8am. I’m expecting a quite a long time for getting results back. Driving back now to hunker down for the next 10 days and have Xmas at home if we can get some food from somewhere! Thank you for all your supportive messages x

That's awful having to go so far to a Test Centre - it's just as well you can drive. I hope they come back negative but from everything you've said it doesn't sound promising. This is when the big 3 supermarkets should be able to step in and get you a delivery I really hope they can. Please keep us updated.

@BBCONEANDTWO will do. few people I have worked with and seen last week are doing their lateral flows now. 1 has done it and negative.

@tootyfruitypickle let me know how you get on with your test results x

Did you get your result op?

@ImAncient nope still waiting, been 48 hours now so hopefully will be sometime today

How are you feeling?

I know a few colleagues who have had positive lateral flow tests but negative PCR so fingers crossed you will be the same. There is a very good chance your cold is what is being detected by the LF test.

[quote oep17]@mumdiva99 It’s similar to a pregnancy/drug test, you get given a swab and a small bottle of solution and a little plastic vial/container. You take the swab from each side of your nose, then swirl it in the solution in the little plastic container and then add three drops to the test strip on a plastic test kit and it slowly (or not in my case it was practically instant) goes positive or negative the same as it does on a pregnancy test. Meant to wait for 30 minutes but like I said I don’t think it was even a minute before there was two lines on mine.

From everything I’ve read they don’t detect a large proportion of positive cases so aren’t the gold standard hence the need to confirm with the proper PCR which is done in a lab[/quote]
It’s two drops, not three!

They are very strict in saying that doing more than two drops can invalidate the test. I know it might be a typo as you’re feeling grotty but just wanted to check.

Of all the kids who’ve have tested positive atdd’s secondary school, almost all HAVENT had the classic cough/temp/loss of taste and smell. THry have had cold symptoms, sore throats, headaches, tummy aches and Runny tummy’s. THe school nurse has asked parents to lie on the form to get the test and this has helped to identify (and succcessfuliy isolate) lots of infectious teenagers. They really needs to change the list of symptoms tbh.

Thank you @amaryllisu I thought we did 3 but just asked my partner who did it with me and he says we did definitely only do two drops. Not sure where I got 3 from

Still waiting for the PCR results, 50 hours now. I am feeling fine still on the whole just a bit tired but still if I didn’t know any better would just say a bad cold. DS had 24 hours of diarrhoea and nothing else and is his usual self, not sure if he has it or not. My partner is saying he feels lightheaded this morning and has a bit more of a cough

STILL no results. So frustrating especially when they know I’m a HCP so I thought they prioritised the results either way either to get people back to work or to ensure any colleagues get quickly traced who might have been exposed. Longer it goes on I’m worried they’ve got lost

Hope they come soon I’m waiting on results too

We're starting to do LF tests from January and I'm hoping the turn around for tests is quick! It's going to be very disruptive to the service if there are lots of false positives and we have to wait days to get the PCR results back!

It's totally justified and I get the need to isolate until the confirmation comes back, but it has to potential to cause havoc to the services we provide!

Sorry you are still waiting for result. I think they are taking a bit longer again. Today we got email from school (still doing track n trace work) about 2 positive cases and apparently both kids had tests Friday and results only thus morning! My son started complaining of sore throat today so I've just got back from test centre with him. I had thought we'd get result Xmas eve which would help determine if i could go to carol service or not (literally my only Xmas plan now) but I'm thinking we won't here til after Xmas.

@breadwidow

Sorry you are still waiting for result. I think they are taking a bit longer again. Today we got email from school (still doing track n trace work) about 2 positive cases and apparently both kids had tests Friday and results only thus morning! My son started complaining of sore throat today so I've just got back from test centre with him. I had thought we'd get result Xmas eve which would help determine if i could go to carol service or not (literally my only Xmas plan now) but I'm thinking we won't here til after Xmas.

We have had similar in the past few days!

Unfortunately if your child is a confirmed close contact of another child with confirmed positive case then your child needs to self isolate for ten days, you can’t get out of isolation with a negative test as they may develop symptoms within the remaining days, sorry

I’m still waiting for results, pretty sure they have got lost/mixed up/missed by this point

@oep17 it took us 5.5 days to get a result last week. We'd also reached the point of thinking it was lost, I guess they are so busy some results are just taking a long time.

I would do another test, as I know so
Many people who have had false positives with the lateral flow tests

It just completely undermines all of it waiting this long for results 😩 if test and trace backdate my isolation from my first onset of symptoms I will be out of isolation before I get my results confirmed at this rate. My contacts will also have mostly missed a large part doing their 10 days of isolation

@GhostofChristmasPresent I know he has to isolate, but if he is has no symptoms then rest of family don't have to isolate too. It's only me going to Carols. Yesterday he complained of sore throat and started clearing his throat a lot so I panicked and got him tested. Today he's totally fine so need results to know whether whole family is isolating or not

@oep17

It just completely undermines all of it waiting this long for results 😩 if test and trace backdate my isolation from my first onset of symptoms I will be out of isolation before I get my results confirmed at this rate. My contacts will also have mostly missed a large part doing their 10 days of isolation

This was the same situation as me when I had symptoms and so got tested in early September when it was also really busy. I got (negative) result after isolation period was over!!

Missing the point somewhat here, but don't your trust test you if you have a positive lateral flow, rather than going through the NHS system? I work for the NHS too and we have been told to contact the COVID testing team at the trust if we get a positive and they will test us themselves rather than going through the usual NHS system.

@testingtesting321 I think some trusts do but it wasn’t an option for me, my manager has been escalating the fact I had to drive an hour to get a test and also waiting this long for a result despite the fact it should be prioritised. It’s just a shambles, literally only got the lateral flow test kit on Thursday it was the first one I’d ever taken!

oep17

It just completely undermines all of it waiting this long for results 😩 if test and trace backdate my isolation from my first onset of symptoms I will be out of isolation before I get my results confirmed at this rate. My contacts will also have mostly missed a large part doing their 10 days of isolation

That was exactly what happened with DD. She'd been at preschool the day before we booked the test. We called them literally within 30 minutes of getting her positive result to let them know people needed to self isolate. By that point it had taken so long to get the result they only had 2 days left they needed to isolate for - if that sort of delay is starting to happen more frequently I'm worried what the implications in case numbers will be.

It’s really poor when we have 40,000 positive tests a day for the results to be taking so long to come back. The research indicates that People don’t isolate properly whilst waiting for results so when it’s taking 5 days for results to come in it’s scary to think how many other people they have infected during that time.

(Not talking about you, OP, just in general)