Sample stability for congenital cytomegalovirus assay using Alethia after prolonged storage at different temperatures

Congenital cytomegalovirus (cCMV) infection is a leading non-genetic cause of sensorineural hearing. Alethia CMV assay is proved to be accurate, simple and appears suitable for CMV testing using neonatal saliva. However, long storage of swab samples is not validated across different time periods and storage temperature. This study verifies the effects of storage time and temperature in detection of CMV from saliva samples using molecular assay developed by Alethia.