Specimen Requirements

Specimen should be collected during the acute phase of the disease as follows:

Blood: Collect 5 mL whole blood into a heparinized tube; sodium heparin preferred. Send at room temperature.

Cerebrospinal fluid: Collect 1 mL CSF aseptically in a sterile dry screw-cap vial. Refrigerate immediately.

Skin lesions: Open the vesicle and absorb exudate into a dry swab and/or vigorously scrape base of freshly exposed lesion with a swab to obtain cells that contain viruses. If enough vesicle fluid is available, aspirate the fluid with a fine gauge needle and tuberculin syringe, and place the fluid into cold viral transport medium. Use viral swabs for specimen collection. Refrigerate immediately.

Eye swab or scraping: Use a viral swab to collect conjunctival material. Take conjunctival scrapings with a fine sterile spatula and transfer the scraping to a viral transport medium. Refrigerate immediately.

Genital swab: See skin. Refrigerate immediately.

Rectal swab: Insert a sterile swab 2” to 4” into the rectum and rub the mucosa. Swab may be placed into cold virus transport medium. Refrigerate immediately.

Throat swab: Carefully rub the posterior wall of the nasopharynx with a dry, sterile swab. Avoid touching the tongue or buccal mucosa. Place swab in viral transport tube.

Feces: Collect 4 to 8 g of feces (about the size of a thumbnail) and place in a clean, screw-cap container. Do not dilute the specimen or use preservatives. Viral swab is acceptable. Refrigerate immediately.

Tissue: Use a fresh set of sterile instruments to collect each tissue. Place each specimen in its own dry, sterile nontoxic screw-cap container. To prevent the tissue from drying out, add a small amount of viral transport medium to the container. Identify each tissue with the patient's name, type of tissue, and date collected. Refrigerate immediately.

Urine: Collect clean-catch, midstream urine in a screw-cap, sterile, plastic container. Refrigerate immediately.