engleski

Important quality indicators for the pre-analytical phase

Quality of a service or a product is a measure of the satisfaction of its consumers or customers. Quality of a healthcare service may thus be defined as a measure of its impact or effect on the patient care. Quality indicators are tools aimed to measure the quality of a health care service. They need to be evidence based, available, accessible and measurable, objective and relevant to the particular system. They also must be able to indicate the potential for improvement, within the continuous improvement cycle. Numerous organizations have attempted to identify a set of quality indicators and quality specifications to be used universally by any laboratory worldwide, regardless of its size, setting, type and geographical location. However, up to today there is still no universal agreement on the core set of quality indicators for preanalytical phase. Until such agreement has been reached, each laboratory needs to define its own indicators and way to implement it into its quality system. When implementing quality indicators, there are many issues to be addressed, such as: valid and reliable definition of the indicator, its relevance to the service, accessibility, availability, reporting frequency, available corrective measures, acceptance limits and some other. Quality indicators in the preanalytical phase of the laboratory testing relate to the test ordering, patient identification, specimen collection, transport and handling. Currently, data from different laboratories are difficult to compare and standardization and harmonization in that respect is of utmost importance.

quality indicators; preanalytical phase

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