Using the laboratory : a handbook for medical practitioners / prepared on the advice of the Standing Medical Advisory Committee and the Central Pathology Committee.

  • Great Britain. Standing Medical Advisory Committee.
Date:
[1971]
Catalogue details

Licence: Open Government Licence

Credit: Using the laboratory : a handbook for medical practitioners / prepared on the advice of the Standing Medical Advisory Committee and the Central Pathology Committee. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    19/108 (page 17)
    2.0 2.0.1 Medical Microbiology General Information on the Transmission and Storage of Bacteriological Specimens Specimens should be handed into the laboratory or to a recognised collecting centre so as to reach the laboratory as soon as possible after taking. It is not generally desirable to send specimens for culture through the post; when this is done postal regulations for pathological specimens must be observed. (Section 1.9.1). If specimens are likely to arrive outside usual laboratory hours, special arrangements should be made with the pathologist. When, for any reason, a specimen cannot reach the laboratory on the day it is taken, it should be kept overnight in a refrigerator, or, if the specimen is a swab, it should be put into transport medium (obtain- able from the laboratory) and kept at room temperature. All swabs from which it is hoped to grow the more delicate organisms such as gonococci should be sent in transport medium. If bacteriological examination is to be done, a specimen should be taken before