Quality management of nuchal translucency ultrasound measurement in Australia

Nuchal translucency measurement has an established role in first trimester screening. Accurate measurement requires that technical guidelines are followed. Performance can be monitored by auditing the distribution of measurements obtained in a series of cases.

The primary aim is to develop an accessible, theory-based educational program for individuals whose distribution of measurements at audit falls outside an acceptable range, and assess operator performance following this intervention.

Operators whose nuchal translucency measurement distributions fall outside a normal range (38-65% above the median) were expected to undergo a teleconference tutorial. Accessible from anywhere in Australia, the one hour tutorials were run by a senior sonographer (to explain technical ultrasound aspects) and the audit program manager (to explain the audit process).

In 2011, 83 operators attended the teleconference tutorials. Compared to a random comparison group of operators meeting standard in 2011, teleconference tutorial attendees were significantly more likely to: (i) operate in rural or regional, rather than metropolitan, centres (P = 0.001); (ii) be less experienced (P < 0.0005); and (iii) have lower annual scan numbers (P = 0.0012). Improvement in nuchal translucency measurement quality was seen after one audit cycle and was maintained over subsequent years. The mean percentage of the study cohort reaching standard over the five-year audit was 77.8% which was not statistically different from the average for the comparison cohort of all other audited operators (79.3%; P = 0.61).

Teleconference tutorials are a convenient, accessible and effective way to obtain immediate and sustained improvement in operator performance.