Quality assurance in biomedical or clinical engineering

Biomedical department directors must begin serious consideration of quality assurance (QA) implementation if they are to satisfy JCAHO directives. This consideration need not be approached with fear or anxiety. The purpose of this paper is to focus attention on the need and purpose of quality assurance in the biomedical or clinical engineering discipline while demonstrating the ease with which QA may be integrated into an existing biomedical environment. Because every biomedical program is unique, the approach described here can serve as a basic guide for tailoring essential components into a working quality assurance system.