Precautions for nasopharyngeal swab sampling

Nasopharyngeal swabs are mainly used for nasal and throat sampling of respiratory and intestinal viruses such as influenza, swine flu, avian influenza, hand, foot and mouth, etc. When using nasopharyngeal sampling swabs, attention should be paid to the following precautions, otherwise it will not only affect the accuracy of sampling, but also cause serious injury to the taker.

Preparation before sampling:  Hand the virus sampling tube to the patient, let the patient take the virus sampling tube, inform the patient that there may be discomfort during the sampling process, and inform the sampling tube to be held vertically, let the patient concentrate on holding the sampling tube, this way The patient’s attention can be focused on the sampling tube to reduce the discomfort caused by nasopharyngeal irritation during the sampling process. Nasal swab patient is unwell, take a deep breath

Posture during sampling:  Tilt the patient’s head back 70 degrees to straighten the passage between the nose and nasopharynx.

Standard sampling method:  “One insertion, Two stop and Three rotations”-measure the distance from the tip of the nose to the front of the ear, half the insertion length, usually about 4 cm for adults; stay for 15-30 seconds to absorb nasopharyngeal secretions (It depends on the patient’s tolerance, the minimum stay time is not less than 3 seconds; take out the nasopharyngeal swab around the rotating joint slowly.

Tips:

(1) The sampler stands on the side of the patient and asks the patient to pull down the mask to expose only the nostrils. Once the sneeze reflex occurs, the patient can be covered by the elbow or paper towel. The sampler is not directly in front of the patient, and the exposure risk is considerably lower.

(2) In many clinical patients, turbinate hypertrophy and nasal passage are narrow. When the throat swab is inserted with resistance, you can not use force rashly. You can try to change one side of the nasal cavity or directly change to oropharyngeal swab collection. People with nasal allergies can easily induce sneezing, and it is recommended to take an oropharyngeal swab.