3C03-AAPM Laboratory Accreditation Program in an International Community

Thomas Slowey

President, K & S Associates

Nashville, TN 37210-3718

In 1971 the AAPM established a system of Regional Calibration Laboratories (RCL) to satisfy the need in the medical community for dosimetry calibrations with reasonable turn-around times at reasonable cost through a close collaboration between the AAPM and the National Bureau of Standards (NBS).  At that time NBS was unable to handle the demand for dosimetry calibrations from the medical physics community.  Over the past 33 years the AAPM accreditation program has grown in the number of labs accredited and in the complexity of the services offered.  In recent years the accreditation program has been modernized to satisfy international standards for the competence of calibration labs (ISO 17025) and standards relating to the operation of a competent accreditation system (ISO Guide 58) in preparation for recognition by the National Cooperation for Laboratory Accreditation (NACLA) and other international laboratory accreditation cooperations (ILAC, APLAC).  This presentation describes the history, the unique fundamental concepts of redundancy in measurements and standards and shows examples of the precision measurement methods that are the basis of this programs long term success.  

3C03－AAPM国际剂量校准实验室授权项目

Thomas Slowey

President, K & S Associates

Nashville, TN 37210-3718

1971年AAPM建立了地区比对实验室（RCL）系统来满足医学界剂量校准的需求，并且通过AAPM和国家标准局（NBS）的密切合作以合理的时间和成本来完成这一任务。那时，国家标准局（NBS）不能满足医学物理界剂量校准的需求。在过去33年的时间里，经AAPM授权的实验室数目和提供服务的程度在AAPM授权项目下得到迅速发展。在最近几年中，经AAPM授权项目已经现代化， 可以满足校准实验室资质标准（ISO 17025）和合格授权系统的运行标准（ISO Guide 58）的国际标准。并正在准备接受国家实验室授权合作组织（NACLA）和其他国际实验室授权合作组织（ILAC, APLAC）等的认可。本报告将回顾一下该项目的历史，详细讲述测量相关的基本概念和相关标准，并举例说明这些精确测量方法，而这些都是该项目长期以来能够取得成功的基础。