July 2022—Good slides in, good images out. Liron Pantanowitz, MD, MHA, explained how to get those good images in a recent webinar on preanalytics quality control in digital pathology, sponsored by Sunquest and made available by the Association for Pathology Informatics.
Read More »Real-time QC: on course for prime time?
September 2020—Bill Gates was just 10 years old and the Beatles were still playing live concerts when the concept of patient-based real-time quality control was proposed in 1965. At the time, patient-based real-time QC (PBRTQC) was based on the “average of normals,” a precursor of moving averages.
Read More »In 2020 checklist, a ‘gentle push’ to next quality level
August 2020—For quality management in the laboratory, it’s not enough to have checks and balances. The checks and balances have to work to improve quality. That’s how Stephen J. Sarewitz, MD, vice chair of the CAP Checklists Committee, characterizes the changes to the quality management requirements in the 2020 laboratory general checklist, released in June.
Read More »Closing the workflow loop: HistoQC for digital slides
July 2020—Unveiled in 2018, HistoQC, an open-source quality control tool for digital pathology slides, was an “awakening to a problem” and the kickoff of a conversation, says Andrew Janowczyk, PhD, its main investigator. And while it’s hard to measure the tool’s use because it’s freely available, he says, reception has been strong. “It’s been a pretty good ride,” he says of its first two years.
Read More »Study of inpatient test utilization practices set to begin
May 2020—Like a top 40 radio hit, test utilization is a topic that can sometimes seem to be overplayed. But the COVID-19 pandemic brings into sharp relief its importance. “What we’ve seen is organizations that have more mature test utilization efforts in place may be better able to handle these crises,” says Peter L. Perrotta, MD, professor and chair of pathology, anatomy, and laboratory medicine at West Virginia University School of Medicine and director of pathology services, West Virginia University Health System.
Read More »New accreditation program checklist section: Imaging mass spec scores its own quality standards
October 2018—It happened for next-generation sequencing. It was an important step for in vivo microscopy. And now it’s taking place with imaging mass spectrometry. The milestone: development and adoption of a set of specialized checklist requirements for laboratories that want CAP accreditation. Imaging mass spectrometry, an adjunct methodology to help pathologists analyze areas of interest in tissue specimens, is, at this point, used in a small number of research laboratories in the U.S., says CAP Checklists Committee member Christopher M. Lehman, MD, clinical professor of pathology, University of Utah College of Medicine, and medical director of the University of Utah Hospital Laboratory.
Read More »Sigma analysis, role and limitations: development of a QC program for the Beckman Coulter AU5812
October 2017—The challenge for all clinical laboratories is to produce the highest quality in vitro diagnostic results in the most efficient manner. Fortunately, high quality and high efficiency are not mutually exclusive, and the direct correlation between the two is well documented.1,2 As the quality of processes increases, so does process efficiency, which ultimately drives down costs.
Read More »Book review: ‘Resource of choice’ for quality management in AP
February 2017—“Quality management” is the practice of continually evaluating, identifying, and improving the diagnostic process. It refers not only to retrospective action taken after mistakes have been made but also to evaluating near misses and opportunities for improvement in every facet of practice.
Read More »Making a smooth pivot to point-of-care IQCP
May 2016—Practically speaking, there’s a limit to the number of balls a human can juggle. And there’s probably a limit to how complex a quality control plan a point-of-care testing coordinator can handle. Last year, many POC coordinators felt that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services would be pushing that limit pretty hard with its new Individualized Quality Control Plan.
Read More »IQCP without agony at the point of care
April 2016—For many point-of-care testing coordinators, the prospect of developing Individualized Quality Control Plans is far from enticing. But there has never been much chance that laboratories could opt out of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ new quality control framework for much of their nonwaived testing.
Read More »IQCP worries? Help with what ends and begins
July 2015—Technically, it’s true: The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ new program, the Individualized Quality Control Plan, is a voluntary, alternative option that clinical laboratories can use to customize their QC plans according to test method, patient population, environment, and personnel competency.
Read More »Paths to validating next-gen sequencing assays
July 2015—As more clinical laboratories tread the unfamiliar ground of next-generation sequencing, they are faced with the age-old challenges of establishing validation and quality control processes. Two experts tackled the topic of molecular QC during a recent CAP TODAY webinar presented in cooperation with Horizon Diagnostics and available for viewing on demand ...
Read More »QC for accreditation: CMS validation inspections
May 2015—Quality control is second nature and part of the air that laboratories breathe. So it’s no surprise that QC should be subject to quality checks of its own, as one of the pivotal checklist areas that CAP’s Laboratory Accreditation Program focuses on during inspections.
Read More »Makeovers smarten core labs’ quality control
February 2015—In speaking to audiences all over the world about the intricacies of risk management through quality control, QC expert Curtis Parvin, PhD, has noticed a certain pattern over the past 10 years. Following his presentation, he’s likely to hear this reaction: “I’m not sure I totally understand that. It sounds pretty impressive, but how do you expect me to go through that process in my lab?”
Read More »In lab QC, how much room for improvement?
October 2014—The debut of the CMS’ new quality control option, IQCP, has sharpened the focus on QC in the laboratory and raised hopes that risk management concepts can make QC more robust. But one of the most highly regarded quality control experts in the U.S. voices skepticism about the impact of IQCP—and indeed, about U.S. quality control standards in general.
Read More »Risk management steps up labs’ QC game under IQCP
September 2014—Industrial risk management. It may not seem all that sexy as a concept, but in the field of laboratory quality control, risk management has become about as buzzworthy as is possible. One of the key reasons: The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has embraced risk management as the foundation of a new option for meeting CLIA quality control standards called IQCP, or Individualized Quality Control Plan.
Read More »Cancelled lab tests—study analyzes why
September 2013—A handful, a fraction of a percent, a tiny portion. In most institutions, that’s about how many tests are cancelled after they’ve been ordered and a specimen has been sent to the laboratory. But even that small number can have significant quality implications. The authors of the Q-Probes study, ”Reasons for Test Cancellation,” looked at more than a million specimen accessions at several dozen institutions, to get a fix on why tests are being cancelled and to gain insight into how laboratories can bring that number down. As the study makes clear, there is definitely room for improvement.
Read More »Microbiology QA, measure for measure
August 2013—In the May 20, 2013 issue of the New Yorker, Google co-founder Sergey Brin is quoted as saying of Internet security: “In big corporations people don’t understand what security people do, for the most part, and no one pays attention to them unless something goes wrong. Frankly, a lot of companies aren’t that interested in security.”
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