Quality assurance of laboratory work and clinical use of laboratory tests in general practice in Norway: A survey

Figures & data

Table I. Responses to selected questions on services pertinent to analytical quality in the office laboratory (percentages).

	Type of practice: 1 vs. 2–3 vs. > 3 doctors^1	Localized in town or larger village vs. smaller village^2	Recent practices vs. established practices^3	All n = 1227
The practice would like routine visits	84–91–96	89–96	95–90	91
The practice has needed acute help with laboratory work	61–72–72	67–73	59–67	69
The frequency of external quality assessment (EQA) surveys should be “as at present”	87–92–94	91–93	90–90	91
Feedback on EQA reports is gone through regularly	78–84–78	79–82	83–81	81
Staff have looked up something in laboratory binders during past month	59–64–67	59–75	70–62	64
Staff have taken part in a NOKLUS course during the past year	37–54–57	47–57	52–51	50
The practice has visited http://www.noklus.no	30–38–48	34–51	39–38	39
Information from both the supplier and NOKLUS when purchasing analysis equipment	34–39–50	39–45	26–43	41
Experienced deficiencies regarding control material, feedback reports, offerings of visits or courses	19–20–16	17–21	20–18	18

Notes: ¹n = 320 (solo practices) versus 545 versus 344 practices; ²n = 824 (town or larger villages – more than 5000 inhabitants) versus 330 (smaller villages); ³n = 96 (recent practices – started 2004–2008) versus 869 (established practices).

Table II. Evaluation of present and possible future offers to the practices (percentages).

	(Very) useful	Neutral	Not very useful or useless	Not assessed or irrelevant
Established offers:	93.5	4.8	1.7	–
Regular information on sample handling, analytical quality, maintenance of laboratory equipment^1
Established offers:	84.7	11.6	3.7	–
Advice on office laboratory repertoire
Not established offers:	75.1	8.4	7.1	7.6
Assessment of blood pressure meters and spirometers
Not established, but has been carried out for periods:	69.7	12.7	8.8	8.8
Yearly submission of case vignettes to the GP to focus on appropriate use of a certain laboratory test
Not established offers (tried out in several practices):	55.7	19.0	11.4	14.0
Yearly reports on the GP's use of laboratory tests based on data excerpts from electronic case records

Notes: ¹All the answers are included (n = 1235); for the other questions, only questionnaires in which the doctor also took part are included (n = 509).