A low-cost point-of-care device for the simultaneous detection of two sexually transmitted bacterial pathogens in vaginal swab samples

Abstract

Curable sexually transmitted infections (STIs) caused by the bacteria Chlamydia trachomatis (CT) and Neisseria gonorrhoeae (NG) are widespread globally. These infections are particularly dangerous for female patients, causing pelvic inflammatory disease, infertility, and increased risk of HIV acquisition. Vaginal self-swab sampling can improve access to STI screening but is still subject to treatment delays due to centralized processing. A low-cost point-of-care (POC) device capable of detecting these bacteria from a self- or clinician-collected vaginal swab could address this delay and allow for more timely treatment. In this work, vaginal swab materials from patients infected with CT or NG required a filtration step before lysis and loop-mediated isothermal amplification (LAMP) detection using a UbiNAAT device. We have shown a simple, low-cost sample preparation method that supports rapid DNA detection from NG and CT on our POC UbiNAAT platform.