Why participate in proficiency testing?

Proficiency testing (PT) is part of the continuous quality assurance of a laboratory’s analytical results. Proficiency testing is an external quality control of the laboratory's ability to analyse and report correct values. There are several reasons why laboratories participate in proficiency testing.

You can:

• Compare your results and performance with accredited laboratories.
• Ensure high analytical quality for operational and self-monitoring purposes.
• Assess the impact of interferences that may occur in the analysis of natural samples.
• Assess the analytical quality when measuring samples with high and low concentration levels.
• Retrieve a theoretical value on an unknown sample.
• Assess the impact from interferences that may arise from the analysis of highly contaminated natural samples.