PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Thomas Holder
AU  - Frances Sophie Woodley Hooper
AU  - David Yates
AU  - Zion Tse
AU  - Samadhan Patil
AU  - Ahmed Moussa
AU  - Lucy Batten
AU  - Vignesh Radhakrishnan
AU  - Mark Allison
AU  - Catherine Hewitt
AU  - Ada Keding
AU  - Greg Forshaw
AU  - Vijay Jayagopal
TI  - Clinical accuracy of infrared temperature measurement devices: a comparison against non-invasive core-body temperature
AID  - 10.7861/clinmed.2022-0252
DP  - 2023 Mar 01
TA  - Clinical Medicine
PG  - 157--163
VI  - 23
IP  - 2
4099  - http://www.rcpjournals.org/content/23/2/157.short
4100  - http://www.rcpjournals.org/content/23/2/157.full
SO  - Clin Med2023 Mar 01; 23
AB  - During the coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, the implementation of non-contact infrared thermometry (NCIT) became an increasingly popular method of screening body temperature. However, data on the accuracy of these devices and the standardisation of their use are limited. In the current study, the body temperature of non-febrile volunteers was measured using infrared (IR) thermography, IR tympanic thermometry and IR gun thermometry at different facial feature locations and distances and compared with SpotOn core-body temperature. Poor agreement was found between all IR devices and SpotOn measurements (intra-class correlation coefficient <0.8). Bland–Alman analysis showed the narrowest limits of agreement with the IR gun at 3 cm from the forehead (bias = 0.19°C, limits of agreement (LOA): −0.58°C to 0.97°C) and widest with the IR gun at the nose (bias = 1.40°C, LOA: −1.15°C to 3.94°C). Thus, our findings challenge the established use of IR thermometry devices within hospital settings without adequate standard operating procedures to reduce operator error.