maristelgp

Hi! This might be a stupid question but I need some feed back from you guys. Do you perform daily qc on your IgG cards for DAT. If yes then what qc material do you use. The reason why I'm asking for your opinion is because we are in debate if it is necessary to really do a DAT qc on an IgG card that we daily qc using our commercially prepared antisera. For me, if you base it by just the reagent being tested I would say NO because it is the same gel card (IgG) but if you base it on methodology and the type of qc reagent (check cells vs antisera) then we do need to do a separate qc. So what do you guys think?

Yes we do QC on the day we use both the indate panel cells (postive and negative QC) and expired panel cells. As for the adendum and standard I have to check with my boss. If she comes in today (doctors appointment).

DebbieL, We basically have almost the same procedure as you had stated. We use the antisera against the antigen we are working on plus a negative control. We do not dilute our antisera. As for antibodies that we really cannot work on (like Lua) we sent it out to the reference lab for workup. I know it is really frustrating what the inspectors do to us. You're lucky if you get an inspector who knows the ins and outs of what we really do for the sake of our patients but majority of them is just to anal about what the standard says. But then again that is their job. The best we can do is to document and follow their recomendation or challenge it the way we did. Have a great day everyone! Mitch

At last we were absolved. It seems there was an adendum to the TJC standard regarding the use of expired panel cells. As long as those expired panel cells are qc'd and that indate panel cells are used for the actual antibody identification then you're good. But then again it depends on the inspector's interpretation of the standards. We actually had three sets of in date panel cells (Panocell 20, Panel A and Panel before but because of cost cuts we ended up with just the panel A. Well at least we are good for now. Let us see when we get inspected again after a few years.

Does anybody know of a regulation that says we can keep expired panel cells for three months and still use it for ruling out antibodies.

TJC is in the house right now and I was just cited for using expired panel cells. She said that even is we did a QC on expired panel cells it is still expired and you can not use it. I tried explaining it to her but the word EXPIRED to her means do not use it at all.

Guess what TJC is on it's third day of inspection in our facility and I just got cited for using specific panel cells from expired lots. I did argued that we do QC those expired panell cells but she said it does not matter because the reagent is still expired. So I guess we do have to send out all our ab ids now to our reference lab and let patients wait.