The challenge of producing an EQA for the COVID-19 pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the clinical medicine landscape. The importance of pathology testing has come to the forefront. Patients or potential patients are dealing directly with laboratories as they line up in carparks or testing staff come to the front doors to obtain samples. Laboratories have had to increase capacity to deal with the high volumes of testing driven by the need to identify and quarantine cases. Supporting this effort, External Quality Assurance scheme providers have also needed to produce COVID-19 Proficiency Testing (PT) programs which are fit for purpose. COVID-19 Point of Care testing has become critical frontline testing and has required the PT programs to be simple to use, readily accessible and robust. We describe a COVID-19 PoCT Serology PT program supported by a mobile phone App. The App is described, and the advantages made explicit. This App suggests that the way that PoCT EQA/PT programs may be deployed in the future.