Screening for C. trachomatis and N. gonorrhoeae Infections by Testing Penile Meatal Swabs and Urine with APTIMA® Combo 2
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Background: Young men are often asymptomatic with C. trachomatis (CT) and/or N. gonorrhoeae (GC), serving as a source of infection and are hesitant to provide urethral swabs. Our objectives were to provide clear instructions for young men to collect meatal swabs and first catch urine (FCU). To determine the performance of a wrapped APTIMA swab (AS, Gen-Probe, Inc.) to a flocked swab (FS, Copan) and measure prevalence of infection according to sample type. Methods: The self-collection method instructed pulling back on the penis shaft to open the meatus and placing in the tip of each swab. The first 20 mL of urine was collected before or after the swab(s). Both the AS and FS were placed into the APTIMA transport tube and all specimens were tested for CT and GC by the APTIMA Combo 2 assay within 48 hours. Results: A total of 511 men (aged 15–25) were enrolled from a youth clinic (80% asymptomatic and 92% uncircumcised). In 293 (group A), the AS was compared to FCU and in 218 (group B), an FCU was compared to an AS and FS. The prevalence of CT and GC infections were 6.8 and 4.4; and 9.1 and 0.4 in the two groups respectively. AS detected 87.5%, FS 85.0% and FCU 82.5% of the CT infections. For GC, the respective values were 100%, 100% and 78.6%. In the swab comparison, both were equal. Slightly more found it easier to collect an FCU and preferred it. Conclusions: Given clear instructions, young men can self collect an MS or FCU for screening. Although a micturition is slightly easier than swabbing, accuracy in getting the first 20 mL of urine may still be a variable in diagnosis. Screening programs should optimize the specimen type and further research should validate the accuracy of the collection component.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.004 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".