1. We recommend to collect sputum for general clinical studies in the morning, on an empty stomach, during a fit of coughing, into a special medical collection container with a wide neck and a screw cap.
2. To prevent an ingress of oral cavity liquids into sputum, perform oral cavity sanitation prior to expectorating -- brush your teeth and rinse mouth and throat with boiled water.
3. If sputum is few, take an expectorant and drink some warm beverage on the day before. The patient collects sputum independently by expectorating thoroughly.
4. For a quality analysis, no less than 5 ml of sputum needs to be collected into a special sterile container.
5. Only sputum resulting from coughing, not from hawking, shall be collected!
   
   The procedure of sputum collection

- Following sanation of the mouth, sit down on a chair near an open window.
- deeply inhale and exhale twice.
- at the third inhalation, get up off the chair to fill the lungs with air and expel air from lungs forcefully so that the diaphragm compacts lungs. This exhalation should cause natural coughing.
- Expectorate sputum and spit it out into a special plastic medical container; close the container firmly with a screw cap.

6. The specimen should be delivered to the laboratory at the earliest possibility, in any case, no later than one hour after sampling. The medical container with the sample shall be stored in a cool dark place.

AFB examination is only performed after consultating a respirologist or a therapeutist and obtaining their official referral.