Specimen Packing and Transport

Shipping to the Minnesota Infectious Disease Laboratory

The Infectious Disease Laboratory often receives hundreds of specimens in a day. To ensure that your sample is processed quickly and accurately, please review the following.

Before submitting a specimen to the Infectious Disease Laboratory, refer to the Clinical Guide to Services' Test Catalog for more information about testing and specimen shipping. See also the Forms for the Infectious Disease Laboratory page for the relevant documentation.

Specimen labeling requirements

The specimen must have two unique patient identifiers that match the patient information provided on the relevant Laboratory Submission Form. Samples that do not have these identifiers will be rejected.

1. The first patient identifier must be:
   • patient name (last and first) OR
   • patient ID # (unique identifying number such as the medical record number or chart number)
2. The second identifier on the sample must be one of the following:
   • patient date of birth (DOB) OR
   • patient ID # (can only be used as the second identifier if the first identifier is the patient name)

Delivery hours

The Minnesota Department of Health-Public Health Laboratory dock is open to accept samples Monday-Friday from 8:00 a.m. - 4:30 p.m. and on Saturday from 8:00 a.m. - 12:00 noon.

Other guidelines

Here are relevant guidelines from other organizations:

• Guidelines for Sentinel-Level Laboratories: The American Society for Microbiology on packing and shipping infectious substances
• CDC Federal Select Agent Program, which oversees the possession, use and transfer of biological select agents and toxins which have the potential to pose a severe threat to the public, to animal or plant health, or to animal or plant products
• International Air Transport Association (IATA) Dangerous Goods Regulation (DGR), including a guidance document and packing instructions
• Hazardous Materials Regulations (HMR), which are issued by the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration and govern the transportation of hazardous materials by highway, rail, vessel, and air. The HMR addresses hazardous materials classification, packaging, hazard communication, emergency response information, and training.

Please visit the Infectious Disease Laboratory Contact Information page with questions.