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Accuracy in Dental Medicine, A New Way to Measure Trueness and Precision
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Published on: April 29, 2014

Accuracy controls: assessing trueness (bias).

David Armbruster1

  • 1Global Scientific Affairs, Abbott Diagnostics, Department 09AA/Building CP1-5, 100 Abbott Park Road, Abbott Park, IL 60064-6096, USA. David.Armbruster@abbott.com

Clinics in Laboratory Medicine
|January 22, 2013
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Clinical laboratories need accuracy controls to measure both assay precision and trueness. These controls, which assess systematic error (bias) and random error, are essential for reliable diagnostic testing and are best provided by reference material experts.

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Area of Science:

  • Clinical Chemistry
  • Laboratory Medicine
  • Metrology

Background:

  • Routine clinical laboratory testing relies on quality control (QC) samples.
  • Current QC practices often focus on precision (random error) using reproducibility controls.
  • Trueness/bias (systematic error) is frequently unassessed by standard QC methods.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To highlight the need for accuracy controls in clinical laboratories.
  • To differentiate between precision and accuracy controls.
  • To define the role of accuracy controls in assessing both systematic and random error.

Main Methods:

  • Discussing the limitations of traditional precision controls.
  • Defining accuracy as a combination of trueness and precision.
  • Emphasizing the requirements for a suitable trueness control material.

Main Results:

  • Standard quality control samples primarily measure reproducibility (random error).
  • Assessing systematic error (bias) requires dedicated accuracy controls.
  • Accuracy controls evaluate both systematic and random error, providing a comprehensive measure of assay performance.

Conclusions:

  • Accuracy controls are necessary to fully assess clinical assay performance.
  • Properly prepared trueness controls can simultaneously evaluate bias and precision.
  • Reference material providers, including metrology institutes and manufacturers, are best positioned to supply these critical accuracy controls.