ECHO equivocal results

[kelliott15506]

Has anyone accomplished training techs to feel comfortable about interpreting equivocal results?  If so what training techniques did you use.

[MAGNUM]

Been using it for about 4 years now, and still no.

[jalomahe]

It's really an experience thing. The more experience they have with ? results the more comfortable they will get.

We've had Echo for 3 years, before that we had Galileo. I would say that techs who are in the department on a regular basis and are comfortable doing blood bank as a whole (good understanding of theory and process) get comfortable with it within a year. Techs who do not like or are not comfortable in blood bank may never be completely comfortable with ? results.

We train with and use the example reactions that Immucor provides. The cards are kept at the bench for quick reference. Also as the techs come across ? results they can get a more experienced tech to review the result with them and explain why they graded it the way that they did.  We also teach the techs that if they are unsure and have no one to ask then they should treat it as positive and follow the workup SOP/flow sheets. Better for them to result out a "Clinically Significants Ruled Out" and do coombs crossmatches than to miss something important. HOWEVER, having said that, when the tech is new you may see a slight up tic in the number of panels being performed. Hopefully not too much unless you are having problems with a lot of unexpected ? on your results in which case you need to do some troubleshooting on your Echo.