This tutorial will explain basic concepts of Metric SPC and help you understand how to assess Metric’s SPC Report and related statistics.
While Calibration enables accurate IHC test results across different labs, SPC enables accurate IHC test results within a lab over time. SPC is the application of statistical methods to monitor the quality of a process, with the goal of detecting outliers or directional trends before they cause assay failure.
A form of SPC, such as Levey-Jennings graphing, is mandatory in most types of clinical laboratory testing. Until now, it has not been feasible in IHC and is therefore not yet required. Nonetheless, SPC is widely considered to represent best practices in laboratory medicine. Now that it is feasible through software programs like Metric, a recent editorial proposed that it should also be required in IHC testing.
The core benefits of implementing SPC in your IHC lab include:
- Using quantitative controls to enable true SPC.
- Creating Levey-Jennings graphs to establish control ranges for acceptable performance and compare control values to peers.
- Aligning a lab to itself over time.
- Verifying heater consistency at each instrument slide position.
- Maintaining consistent biomarker concentrations from lot to lot.
- Providing simple and efficient management of IHC controls inventory.
BCS recommends putting an IHControl spot on every tissue slide and running SPC every day for optimal SPC results.