Point of care testing in general haematology.

Point of care testing (POCT) refers to any testing performed outside the hospital laboratory, near or at the site of the patient where the result influences patient management (ISO 15189:2012; ISO 22870:2016). At the same time, the accreditation requirements for clinical laboratories, specified in the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 15189:2012 and ISO 22870:2016 standards (ISO, [31], [32]), have driven the development of comprehensive clinical, financial and quality governance. Patient results should be filed permanently in the patient electronic patient record if available, or paper records, and clearly identified as a POCT result along with the operator who performed the test. Where there is a large number of the same model/make of POCT devices on one site, a minimum of one POCT device should be chosen for an extensive verification as per ISO minimum verification requirements for ISO 17025 and ISO 15189 testing laboratories. [Extracted from the article]