Quality Cross Check Programs

CAP Quality Cross Check is a convenient solution for monitoring all the instruments in your laboratory on a routine basis while at the same time augmenting your instrument comparability efforts. These programs are designed to complement your existing proficiency testing and enhance quality assurance efforts.

Laboratory Benefits

By enrolling in one of our Quality Cross Check programs, you will:

• Save valuable staff time by providing customized reports with both peer group comparisons and instrument comparability statistics to augment instrument comparability studies
• Identify potential instrument problems before they impact patient testing and proficiency testing results
• Learn about additional opportunities for your laboratory staff to fulfill competency assessment requirements

Stay in Compliance

Our Quality Cross Check programs are compliant with the directive regarding proficiency testing on multiple instruments from the United States Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS).

Learn more about recent changes in the CMS directive for multiple instrument testing.

Proficiency testing for waived whole blood glucose on glucose meters is no longer required for laboratories accredited by the CAP. Laboratories are required to perform alternative performance assessment.

In response to this change, the CAP has introduced Quality Cross Check—Whole Blood Glucose (WBGQ) to better meet the need your needs for alternative performance assessment.

Learn more about how to monitor performance of glucose meters and stay in compliance.

How it works

Participants will receive:

• Additional specimens for testing and reporting up to three instruments
• Three challenges in each of the two mailings a year that span the clinical range
• A customized report package, one page for each reported analyte
  • Evaluation 1: Peer Group Comparisons, which include:
    • Peer group assignment, targets, acceptability limits, and summary statistics for each reported instrument and specimen
    • Evaluation of reported results for each instrument and specimen and a graphical summary of the deviation relative to the acceptability limits
  • Evaluation 2: Instrument comparisons, which include absolute and percent pairwise differences between reported instruments and specimens
  • Participant Summary (PS): Lists of results by peer group to help you compare data against your evaluation report.