Start with good light
Daylight from a window works well. Lay the paper where it is evenly lit and avoid your own shadow falling across it. Turn the phone's flash off for glossy paper, because the flash makes a bright patch that hides the text underneath.
Keep the page flat and the phone parallel
Put the report on a table and smooth out folds. Hold the phone directly above the page, parallel to it, so that the lines of text are straight and the columns stay square. A phone held at an angle makes the far side of the page small and blurred.
Fit the whole page in the frame
Keep all four edges of the page in view with a small margin around them. Do not crop out the header, the unit column or the reference range, because the numbers on their own are not enough to read a result. Keep your fingers off the text.
One page at a time, in order
A lab report often runs to several pages. Photograph every page, in order, even the last one with the lab's comments. A missing page means missing results.
Deal with glare and small print
If the page shines, tilt the paper slightly or move to a different spot until the bright patch leaves the text. If the print is very small, do not zoom in digitally: move the phone a little closer, tap the screen so that the camera focuses on the text and retake the photo.
Check before you send
Zoom in on the photo and read a line or two. If you can read it comfortably, an app probably can. If you cannot, retake it. MyCareTrack also checks each photo before it keeps anything: a photo that is not a medical document or cannot be read ends in a clear message and no made-up record.
A PDF that you upload is kept with your records as it is. MyCareTrack reads photos of lab reports, prescriptions, medicine labels and bills, and it does not read the contents of a PDF.