The antibody test works by analysing a sample of your blood to test it for COVID-19 antibodies. An antibody is a protein that the body produces to help fight infection.
1 biomarker as listed by LloydsPharmacy Online Doctor.
The antibody test works by analysing a sample of your blood to test it for COVID-19 antibodies. An antibody is a protein that the body produces to help fight infection. If you have had COVID-19 or had the vaccine against it, your body might have produced specific antibodies to fight off the virus.
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If you think you've had COVID-19 in the past, this antibody test can confirm this. Or you can use this test to check your body's immune response to the COVID vaccine.
If you think you currently have COVID-19, you should get a COVID-19 swab test, which will confirm if you have the virus now.
If you test positive for antibodies it means that there were COVID-19 antibodies in your blood sample. This means your body has produced a response to COVID-19, either from having the virus or the COVID-19 vaccine.
A positive result will not be able to distinguish if your antibodies are due to a previous COVID-19 infection or a COVID-19 vaccine.
You will also be told your antibody level. Your antibody level is the number of antibodies in your blood. If you test positive this can be anything from 0.8-2500+. The level of antibodies can suggest your body's response to either the virus or vaccine.
As COVID-19 is still a fairly new virus, we don't know yet what the significance is of each value or whether your immune response is high or low, whether it can change with time, or how long you might have it for.
The test has specificity of 98.8% and a sensitivity of 99.8%.
This means that:
If you'd like to test your immune response after the COVID-19 vaccine, you can do this from 14 days after your first dose.
You can get tested again from 14 days after you second vaccine, to see if your antibody level has changed.
No vaccine or antibody test is 100% effective. There is a small chance you'll test negative even though you've had the vaccine.
Not everyone who's had COVID-19 will test positive for antibodies. This can be due to low levels of antibodies in your system or the time that's passed since having the virus.
To collect the sample from the antibody COVID-19 test you'll need to prick your middle or ring finger to produce blood. It's important you follow the instructions provided in the kit very closely. We've also created a handy step-by-step guide below.
Description provided by LloydsPharmacy Online Doctor.
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