title: Essential aspects of external quality assurance for point-of-care testing.
abstract: External quality assurance (EQA) or proficiency testing for point-of-care (POC) testing is in principle similar to EQA for larger hospital laboratories, but the participants are different. The participants are usually health care personnel with little or no knowledge of laboratory medicine. The implication of this is that the EQA provider has to a) convince the participants that participation in EQA schemes are important, b) be able to circulate materials with reasonable time intervals, c) produce feedback reports that are understandable, and d) offer help and guidance to the participants when needed. It is also important that EQA for POC testing e) address the pre-examination, the examination and the post-examination processes, and f) that schemes for measurement procedures using interval or ordinal scale are offered. The aim of the present paper is to highlight important issues of these essential aspects of EQA for POC testing.
authors.affiliation: The Norwegian Quality Improvement of Primary Care Laboratories (Noklus), Haraldsplass Deaconess Hospital, Bergen, Norway .
authors.forename: Anne
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Stavelin
authors.affiliation: The Norwegian Quality Improvement of Primary Care Laboratories (Noklus), Haraldsplass Deaconess Hospital, Bergen, Norway.; Department of Public Health and Primary Health Care, Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway.
authors.forename: Sverre
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Sandberg
mesh_terms: D019411:Clinical Laboratory Techniques / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D013677:Medical Laboratory Science / Q000592:standards*; D010338:Pathology, Clinical / Q000592:standards*; D000067716:Point-of-Care Testing / Q000458:organization & administration*; D011785:Quality Assurance, Health Care; D011786:Quality Control
keywords: health care; health personnel; laboratory proficiency testing; point-of-care testing; quality assurance