HIV Viral Load Control
May I seek for idea relate to HIV Viral Load testing control ? Do we use control from the machine to plot in the chart or internal control to plot in the chart ? By the way, my lab do not have internal control for HIV Viral load testing, we use commercial kit along with the reagent.
Comments
Dear @Pich Sopanha , I'm glad to see this kind of discussion agenda/topic under this forum.
In real sense you have to plot a graph using the manufacture's controls that are mandatory to be included when setting each HIV Viral Load run. The inhouse controls (Laboratory prepared external Quality Controls (EQC)) will be used just for ensuring consistency of results validity and it better to have the EQC for HPC, LPC and NC materials (normally patients' specimen).
Actually, in our settings we do plot LJ charts using the LPC and HPC separately then we subject them to Westgard rules for interpretation and possible actions whenever required.
Note: There are platforms (I think all) with manufacturers' IQC for the whole process validity check, but you can only view the CT values for these IQC which is not applicable in LJ chats for HIV Viral load. Then the manufacturers' LPC and HPC (commercial) will be useful in LJ Charts.
we don't have in house control, since it is difficult to get sample with different level with huge amount for preparing, so we decide to use manufacture control from the machine to plot in LJ chart. I am worried that for ISO assessment LJ chart should be another control beside manufacturers control . Thank you for advise
@Pich Sopanha I agree with @Musa Shija on the use of IQC. Some platforms have QC materials which may be analyzed within the the same plate/worksheet as the patient samples. The newer platforms with continuous loading options may have controls which uses a different approach. Depending on the available option, the system performance need to be monitored using the LJ chart. The in-built QC system once programmed will enable you do this. If not available, you may adopt an excel or equivalent method to plot the QC results.
Dear @Pich Sopanha , just use the manufactures' control results that are tested in parallel with clients' samples in each run.