ADVER TISEMENT FEA TURE
An early building block for POCT governance was harmonisation of equipment, choosing the right blood gas analysers, plus associated IT systems and customer support.
Achieving accreditation
Aſter harmonising its blood gas service, SWLP could then undertake POCT accreditation in earnest with the firm support of Radiometer. “For accreditation we grew our team significantly as there are many mandatory roles, such as Quality Manager, Clinical Lead or Training Facilitator,” said Haval. Preparing for accreditation, this growing team performed a gap analysis to identify areas in need of change or improvement – governance and risk management being key. “Within six months we were able to close all the gaps and were in a position to obtain POCT accreditation as the largest accredited blood gas service in the country.” Haval added: “Achieving accreditation was a testament to the
hard work and dedication of the SWLP POCT team and the amazing collaboration of our medical, nursing and midwifery colleagues who use our services in their departments.” Haval noted that Radiometer played a central role in this
accreditation journey. “Firstly, Radiometer’s was the right analyser for us, due to all its safety features covering pre-analytical and analytical processes. Te company also provided the customer and technical support we needed, from installation to their ongoing support now, and helped us with the verification works. Ten, training was important, which it also facilitated. We could use Radiometer documentation as a precursor for our training certification which it developed with us.” Having achieved accreditation, SWLP must maintain this status.
“Radiometer continues to support us with the ongoing training and come once a month to deliver on-site training to new and existing staff,” said Haval. “It also provides IT support for the AQURE middleware system and setting up interfaces, as well as assistance with the reports we get from AQURE, such as QC analysis and analyser uptime. We also use the data insights available via Radiometer’s soſtware for our monthly quality report, required by UKAS inspectors.”
Accreditation overview
SWLP had to overcome several key challenges in its POCT accreditation journey, the first being building its POCT resources up from a team of one. Ten the pandemic placed huge demand on blood gas analysis, as almost every COVID patient required some form of ventilation, yet the team still had to continue simultaneously with accreditation preparation. Haval explained the third key challenge: “Aligning the resources from
other departments in the Trust was challenging. Particularly IT, which needed to assign resources to complete the results interface through
to the EPR. For this they worked very closely and effectively with Radiometer’s team to complete just in time, before the first wave of the pandemic!” Now as one of the UK’s first and largest accredited POCT services,
SWLP delivers high quality, accessible diagnostics at the point of need for clinical services, improving clinical outcomes and enhancing patient experience across southwest London. From this inspiring accreditation journey, Haval concluded: “I think
every point of care manager must have a clear business plan with a vision for the next five years. For me, this was to become an effective and patient-centric accredited POCT department and a pathology discipline that is a future growth area for our laboratory. “It was hard work, with many challenges and there were multiple
business cases. Tey were all successful though, helped by having a holistic approach looking beyond the laboratory and fully engaging with the right stakeholders, both within SWLP leadership and network partnership, and externally by building partnerships with reputable POC suppliers such as Radiometer.”
Reference
1 Te Association for Clinical Biochemistry & Laboratory Medicine, Institute of Biomedical Science, Te Royal College of Pathologists. Point of care testing: National strategic guidance for at point of need testing. (2023) https://
www.rcpath.org/static/f8b1c450-d90b-4361-848897c4a81d5d6b/National- Strategic-Guidance-for-at-Point-of-Need-Testing.pdf
South West London Pathology (SWLP)
SWLP is an award-winning NHS pathology partnership between Croydon Health Services NHS Trust, Kingston Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and St. George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust which provides a single, integrated pathology service across southwest London and beyond.
Te service covers 3.5 million people, five hospitals and over 450 GP practices. SWLP’s clinical blood sciences and microbiology laboratories offer clinical and scientific advice 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Other services include: cellular pathology, clinical blood sciences, immunology and medical microbiology.
www.swlpath.nhs.uk
For further information, contact:
Radiometer Limited, Manor Court, Manor Royal, Crawley, West Sussex RH10 9FY Tel: 01293 517599 Email:
sales@radiometer.co.uk Web:
www.radiometer.co.uk
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