J Lab Med Qual Assur.  2008 Jun;30(1):133-149.

Annual Report on External Quality Assessment in Therapeutic Drug Monitoring and Drug of Abuse in Korea (2007)

• Kim JH
• Kim BK
• Lee SY
• Chun S
• Kwon GC
• Yoon Y
• Lim JB
• Shin DH
• Song KE
• Song SM
• Suh SP
• Kim JQ

Abstract

Two trials of external quality assessment for Therapeutic Drug Monitoring (TDM) subcommittee of Korean Association of Quality Assurance for Clinical Laboratory (KAQACL) were performed in 2007. Number of participating laboratories were increased to 109, by 5.63% increase comparing with the previous year. Response rates reached 98.7% for both trials slightly lower than that of the previous year. Two kinds of control materials were requested to be tested in each trial so that each institution could know the possible systematic error. In both trials, 20 test items were responded at least from one laboratory. The average drug item was 6.3 per institution, which was decreased slightly from 6.8 in recent 5 years. The most common test items were valproic acid, digoxin, carbamazepine, theophylline, phenytoin, and phenobarbital which were peformed in more than 55% of the participating laboratories, followed by cyclosporine, vancomycin, lithium, tacrolimus, methotrexate, amikacin, gentamicin, salicylate, tobramycin, acetaminophen, primidone, free phenytoin, and amitryptyline. The inter-laboratory coefficients of variations showed simliar tendency comparing with those of the previous years. We started the proficiency test for drug of abuse from 2007 and got the response from 13 and 17 laboratories in the 1st and 2nd trial, respectively. Average drug items were 3.4 for the 2nd trial. We found the relatively good performances as we got the correct answers from all laboratories except 4 for each one mistake. In conclusion, the TDM external quality assessment of 2007 showed grossly similar pattern comparing with those of previous year and drug of abuse proficiency testing showed a relatively good performance.

Keyword

Quality assurance; External quality assessment; Therapeutic drug monitoring

MeSH Terms

Acetaminophen
Amikacin
Carbamazepine
Cyclosporine
Digoxin
Drug Monitoring
Gentamicins
Korea
Lithium
Methotrexate
Phenobarbital
Phenytoin
Primidone
Tacrolimus
Theophylline
Tobramycin
Valproic Acid
Vancomycin
Acetaminophen
Amikacin
Carbamazepine
Cyclosporine
Digoxin
Gentamicins
Lithium
Methotrexate
Phenobarbital
Phenytoin
Primidone
Tacrolimus
Theophylline
Tobramycin
Valproic Acid
Vancomycin