Introduction

The Synovial Fluid discipline programs are structured to provide a peer group comparison of individual participant results with all results received. Programs are designed to analyse survey data and provide participants with reports that will review survey results and highlight participant performance.

Participant Performance

The results are determined by a target value as set by the Chair and the Synovial Fluid Referee. The report will provide a review of all survey results and may be commented upon by the Program Chair of RCPAQAP Synovial Fluid.

RCPAQAP advises that participant enquiries relating to information contained in RCPAQAP reports should be forwarded directly to program staff rather than to the report reviewer or committee member.

Survey Reports

The Synovial Fluid disciplines will use the harmonised reporting structure, which will provide participants with a summary of performance, result review, method review, discussion, and a cumulative summary of the year’s performance at the end of the report.

Measurement system used by your laboratory: Lists the measurement system returned at result entry in the myQAP portal.
Performance assessment: Provides the assessment of your results against the expected result, highlighting results in red if results are assessed as “Discordant”.
Overall Performance: Provides a comment on the overall performance of this survey.

The Result review page will provide participants with a breakdown of the responses received for the crystal identification. The histograms provide a review of the responses received for each test. The dark blue overlay represents the results returned by other participants using your method. The “blue” (●) circle represents the result provided by your laboratory. The discussion has the clinical notes for the sample with the chair’s comments.

The method comparison table provides a performance breakdown the methods used to identify the crystals.

The cumulative assessment is provided at the end of the survey report and will provide participants with ongoing survey performance.

Educational Component

The report should be read in conjunction with the second video available in the myQAP portal, which has a commentary with the correct responses. The report will show the target response and the participant’s response. The number of participants who correctly identified the target response with the percentage compared to all participants who returned their results.