When you receive a 24-hour urine request slip from your doctor or clinic, please take it to a UWHC Outpatient Lab. Lab staff will give you a plastic jug to collect and store your urine. A preservative may be added to the jug. Do not pour this out of the jug.

It is very important to keep the urine in the fridge until you deliver it to the lab.

The jug should be labeled with instructions for how to collect your urine. Make sure you follow these instructions to collect a 24-hour urine sample. 

  1. When you wake up on the day you start to collect your urine, urinate (void) into the toilet. Do not put this first urine in the jug. 

  2. Write the date and time that you voided this urine into the toilet on the label as the starting date/time.

  3. During the next 24 hours, collect all the urine you void into the jug. 

  4. When you wake up the next day (24 hours after the starting date/time), you will empty your bladder and add this urine to the urine in the jug. 

  5. Write the date and time of this void as the ending date/time on the label. 

Make sure you wake up around the same time both days. The starting and ending times must be about the same on both days (within one hour). During the time you are saving your urine, store the jug in the fridge. Put the jug inside a large plastic bag before you put it in the fridge.

The jug must be labeled with two different forms of identification. Your full name and medical record number are preferred. Your full name and date of birth are also okay. Seal tightly and take the 24-hour urine jug to the Outpatient Lab at the hospital or any of the UW Health clinic labs. See www.uwhealth.org/lab for sites. When you drop it off, the lab staff must double check the jug while you are present to make sure the jug is labeled correctly. 

Your test results will be sent to your health care provider. You will get the test results by phone, letter or at your next clinic visit.