Neonatal bilirubin testing practices: reports from 312 laboratories enrolled in the Colege of American Pathologists Excel Proficiency Testing Program.

OBJECTIVE: To characterize laboratory practices for neonatal bilirubin testing and to identify opportunities for improvement.
DESIGN: A voluntary self-assessment questionnaire was used to assess the laboratory practices of 312 laboratories subscribing to the College of American Pathologists (CAP) Excel Chemistry Proficiency Testing Program.
RESULTS: A range of preanalytic and analytic practices were reported. The most notable problems identified were the use of overly long capillary puncture devices (17.8%), failure to protect the specimen from light prior to analysis (3.4%), failure to use a control containing >171 micromol/L bilirubin (26.1%), use of single-level control (4.2%), and lack of established linearity limits (7.0%).
CONCLUSION: Opportunities exist to improve specimen collection, processing, and analysis for some physician-office and small-hospital laboratories.