Here are some important DO’s and DON’T’s that highlight common errors users make with the 50.34 Specimen Submission Form. Please take a look.
If you have a question and don’t see it here, scroll down to the FAQ’s (Frequently Asked Questions) below. If you still don’t have your answer, email or call the Infectious Diseases Specimen Submission (IDSS) Help Desk located on this site below the DO’s and DON’T’s table.
The Infectious Diseases Specimen Submission (IDSS) Help Desk serves as the central point of contact for submitters of specimens who have questions or issues related to submitting specimens to CDC, including completing and submitting the Specimen Submission Form (Form 50.34) and using the test directory for selecting specific test orders. Questions regarding the detailed information contained within a test order should be addressed to the contact person listed for that test order.
The CDC Infectious Diseases Laboratories offer various services for laboratory testing. CDC often receives inquiries regarding information concerning submission forms, testing services, and laboratory reporting. Below is a list of inquiries and responses pertaining to these services. The list will be updated as more inquiries are received and responses are complete.
A completed 50.34 CDC Specimen Submission Form must be supplied with each specimen received at CDC (i.e., one specimen per form). If a submitter is sending in a large number of specimens, the submitter may work with a CDC lab to submit specimens using a batch form.
Yes, the new form may be distinguished from the old version of Form 50.34, by the version number and expiration date at the bottom of the form. The form will be reviewed every six months for updates at which time it will receive a new version number and expiration date. The updated CDC 50.34 form replaces the green DASH form which is obsolete as of February 4, 2013.
A notification about the new form was posted on EpiX and the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists (CSTE) have been contacted. CSTE is targeting communications through their Infectious Diseases committees.
Both the State Public Health Laboratories and the CDC laboratories should educate submitters that a new form is required for submissions. Announcements were posted to the ASM list serves (DivC and ClinMicroNet) to inform the clinical laboratories about the new CDC submission form and to contact their State Public Health Laboratories if they are authorized to send specimens directly to CDC. Hospital laboratories should not download a copy of the form from the internet but should obtain a form that has been pre-populated with the standardized State PHL submitter information to ensure expedited reporting of results.
Hospitals should not send their specimens directly to CDC unless the State PHL authorizes this for a special study or outbreak or urgent request. If a specimen or isolate is labile, then sending it directly to CDC may be necessary. If a State PHL wants a clinical laboratory to submit their specimen directly, the State PHL should fill out their contact information and standardized institution email address on the form and provide this as a template to the clinical lab to use. That contact information will ensure results get sent back to the State PHL, who can capture this data and then the State PHL can send the results back to the clinical laboratory. A State PHL can provide this template once for clinical labs to use until the form expires.
No, you should send both forms with your specimen. Laboratory-specific forms are needed by some CDC laboratories in addition to CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34 to perform certain tests. When those test orders are selected on the CDC 50.34, a link will appear as a reminder that an additional form or approval is required.
Submitters must reprint both pages of the form to ensure that the updated information gets encoded into the appropriate barcode(s), and to ensure the linkage between the barcodes is maintained.
Not always. In order to ensure that the form functions properly, you must first save the form to your hard drive and reopen it using Adobe Reader® or Adobe Acrobat. When the form is opened in the website, you may actually be viewing it using a non-Adobe product, such as Safari Reader, CutePDF, XPDF, PDFXChange, Foxit Reader, or one of the other myriad applications on the market available to view PDF files. The form was designed using Adobe products and has been tested to work using Adobe products such Adobe Reader® X or later and Adobe Acrobat Pro. Adobe Reader® is available to download for free at the Adobe website www.adobe.com/products/reader.html.
Adobe® Reader IX and above may be used to complete and print the form, though it is recommended to use the latest version available.
No. The CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34 is designed to be filled out electronically, printed and sent to CDC along with a sample. The CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34 should not be sent via unsecure email because of PII data.
Completed specimen submission forms (the 50.34 form will no longer be known as the DASH form) are available to the staff who are involved in the submission of the specimen(s), which includes epidemiologists.
CDC Specimen Submission Form information is validated and encoded in the barcodes when the form is printed using Adobe® Reader IX and later. The barcode is hidden until the information is validated.
No. Printing the form on a black/white or color printer are both acceptable.
Yes, the expiration alerts are built directly into the CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34 and will appear when a user opens an expiring form on their computer.
If you want to share the CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34 with your SPHL information, you can complete the SPHL submitter information in the Adobe fillable form and save the PDF. The PDF file with your SPHL submitter information can then be shared. Information populated on the form cannot be locked.
Yes, CDC recognizes that a PHL’s points of contact may vary per submission, and therefore CDC can store multiple points of contact for each submitting organization. In contrast, there should only be one Laboratory Director for each PHL.
A formal request will need to be submitted to the helpdesk at CDC_ID_Lab.info@cdc.gov (404-639-2176 locally or 1-855-612-7575 toll-free) to inform CDC of the change to the SPHL information.
Yes. If they are the original submitter of a specimen, then local and county public health laboratories would fill out the original submitter box when submitting the CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34. The State should supply the form with the acceptable SPHL submitter information already completed to local and county public health laboratories that have permission to submit directly to CDC.
Yes, saved PHL submitter information is retained when changing the specimen origin (e.g. switching the form from human to animal).
They fill out the top submitter block and complete the rest of the form as appropriate. If language is a barrier to completing the form, the submitter must contact an appropriate CDC laboratory to establish a process for submitting specimens to CDC.
Only one test order code/name can be entered on the CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34. It should be noted that these fields are drop down values on the form and a test order may encompass a panel of multiple tests.
The field ‘Specimen Source Modifier’ allows one to say if the specimen is acute or convalescent. For noting what it is paired to, or part of a set, then a submitter could use the ‘Brief Clinical Summary’, or ‘Previous Laboratory Results’ fields for denoting this information, both located on the back side of the form. The Extent area on the back side of the form allows one to define a particular outbreak if that is the case.
The submitter should select the blank entry in the drop down list.
No, there is no capability to populate the CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34 from a LIMS, spreadsheet, or database.
Comments should be added to the field labeled Previous Laboratory Results / Comments, located on the back of the form.
Submitters can only order tests that are contained within the current Test Directory. Submitters may view the most current list of orderable tests by visiting the Test Directory site.
A test order name may encompass a single test or a panel of multiple tests. A submitter may obtain more detailed information about what tests may be performed to complete the order from the CDC Points of Contact listed at the bottom of each test order.
For additions and/or deletions to test orders, the directory will be updated concurrently with updates to the CDC Specimen Submission Form 50.34; therefore, additions and/or deletions will occur every 6 months. For edits to current test orders, these will be made on a more routine basis as needed and changes can be identified through a version number for each test order. The full downloadable test directory catalog will also be updated on an as needed basis.
If there is a question about the data content contained on a CDC laboratory report, please contact the point of contact listed on the report. If there is a question about the delivery of the report, or a question about the encryption on a report, please contact the IDSS Help Desk by email or by phone 1-855-612-7575.
The CDC ID laboratory reporting process has been enhanced to provide electronic lab reports through secure email (i.e. eReporting). These reports will be sent as encrypted PDF files via secure password protection. Passwords are provided to institutions participating in the eReporting process and are unique to each institution. All eReports will be sent from the CDC email address CDCIDLabReports@cdc.gov. CDC will continue to send hardcopy reports as needed.
Preliminary, final, amended, and corrected reports are all eligible to be sent as an eReport.
CDC has contacted State Public Health Laboratories (SPHLs) and those that have agreed to participate in the eReporting process will be receiving eReports. As CDC further develops its capabilities on eReporting, participation in eReporting will likely be expanded to include additional submitters.
For submitters participating in eReporting, a password will be provided to each institution. The password will be used to access every eReport sent from CDCIDLabReports@cdc.gov. If a password is lost or stolen, the submitter can contact the IDSS Help Desk by email or by phone 1-855-612-7575.
Yes! The eReports are linked to the submitter information provided on the form. It is essential that the submitter uses the correct institutional email address provided to CDC as part of their standardized submitter address information.
At this time, not all CDC labs will have the capability to send eReports, and therefore, will continue to send hard copy reports to submitters.
CDC Laboratory eReports will be sent out twice daily from the CDCIDLabReports@cdc.gov email address.
The CDCIDLabReports@cdc.gov email address that delivered the eReport will receive a delivery failure message for recipient email addresses that no longer exist. The CDC laboratory distributing the report will contact the institution to follow up with regard to the actions that need to take place.
No. The eReporting process does not support a systematic re-send of a previously distributed eReport. If a submitter requests a copy of a distributed eReport from CDC, the submitter should contact the laboratory point of contact on the report to request a hard copy of the report. A report that was previously sent as an eReports can be sent out again through the eReporting process as amended or corrected reports only; otherwise a hard copy will be sent to the submitter.