Fever screening and detection of febrile arrivals at an international airport in Korea: association among self-reported fever, infrared thermal camera scanning, and tympanic temperature

OBJECTIVES: The purpose of this research was to measure fever prevalence and the effectiveness of a fever screening procedure in detecting febrile arrivals at an international airport in Korea. METHODS: Data were retrieved from arrivals' health declaration forms and questionnaires for febrile arrivals at an international airport collected by a national quarantine station during the year 2012. Self-reported health declaration forms were returned by 355,887 arrivals (61% of the total arrivals). Of these, 608 symptomatic arrivals (0.2%) including 6 febrile arrivals were analyzed. RESULTS: Fever prevalence at an international airport in Korea was 0.002%. Self-reported fever was signifi-cantly positively associated with tympanic temperature (p< 0.001). The difference between the thermal cam-era temperature (36.83°C) and tympanic (or ear) temperature (38.14°C) was not statistically significant. CONCLUSIONS: The findings imply that a procedure for mass detection of fever such as self-reported ques-tionnaires and thermal camera scanning may serve as an effective tool for detecting febrile arrivals at quaran-tine stations. Future research can benefit from looking at the sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value of the entry screening system.