Durda Slavic and Sarah Lippert

Animal Health Laboratory, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON

AHL Newsletter 2025;29(3):5.

AHL is replacing Amies gel-based swabs with ESwabs, a new transport system for microbiology testing.  ESwab is a multi-purpose collection and transport system consisting of a flocked swab and 1 mL of liquid Amies transport medium in a screw cap tube. Upon collection, the clinical specimen is eluted from the flocked swab into the liquid medium and maintains viability of a variety of microorganisms for up to 48 h at both room and refrigerated temperatures. Uniform suspension of the specimen results in more consistent sample application on different culture plates and can be used for multiple tests. This system can be used for aerobic, anaerobic, Mycoplasma, Ureaplasma and fungal cultures, as well as PCR testing. The liquid medium in ESwabs is also suitable for the transport of small tissue samples for culture submission.

Please note that these tubes are not suitable for virus isolation – VTM swabs are still the best option for this test. 

We highly recommend the use of ESwabs for all your microbiology testing needs. The price is comparable to current gel-based swabs. For pricing and ordering please contact ahlinfo@uoguelph.ca [1].