ReviewJournal of public health in Africa2025
Asymptomatic testing people for SARS-CoV-2 in healthcare facilities: A systematic review.
Review in Journal of public health in Africa, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
0 citing papers in PubMed.
No citing paper in PubMed yet.
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
9 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Background: Asymptomatic testing involves the process whereby individuals who do not show symptoms of COVID-19 are tested for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection using any of the available laboratory test techniques. Aim: To evaluate the effectiveness of testing asymptomatic individuals visiting, living or working in healthcare facilities in reducing SARS-CoV-2 viral infections. Setting: Healthcare databases. Method: Electronic databases were searched and limited to English language and studies published 2020 to 02 September 2022. Following the methods for rapid systematic reviews, data were analysed using a fixed effect model, and results of the effect estimate were reported as odds ratios (OR) with their confidence intervals (CI) (95% CI). Results: Databases' searches yielded 3065 articles after deduplication and 3 studies by searching reference lists of included articles. After screening abstracts and full text articles, 3 cohort studies were included, each with serious risk of bias. Very low certainty evidence shows a decrease in occurrence of SARS-CoV-2 infections in the asymptomatic testing group among patients going for index surgery (OR: 0.05, 95 % CI: 0.00-0.82; 501 participants; 1 study) and among long term care facility staff (OR: 0.31, 95 % CI: 0.18-0.52; 3457 participants; 2 studies, Conclusion: There is limited quality evidence to support asymptomatic testing of individuals for SARS-CoV-2 in the prevention of virus transmission in health care settings. Contribution: In the event of a future pandemic, this review offers current evidence on the potential effects of asymptomatic testing.
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