Preface

1998 ◽  
Vol 38 (7) ◽  
pp. I
Author(s):  
Leigh Sparrow

Summary. In relatively few years, the Australian Soil and Plant Analysis Council Inc. (ASPAC) has conducted 2 inter-laboratory proficiency programs on plant material and 3 inter-laboratory proficiency programs on soils. The purpose of these performance-based programs is to enhance the quality of soil and plant analysis in Australasia, with guidance where necessary from the soil and plant expertise of ASPAC members. ASPAC’s inaugural ‘Accreditation Committee’ reviewed published standards and existing laboratory accreditation/proficiency programs in Australia and internationally before developing what is now in full operation. This historical perspective and the 12 principles that guide operations of ASPAC’s soil and plant proficiency programs are described, as are the numeric procedures used to determine satisfactory performance. Certificates are issued to successful laboratories on completion of each program. Moreover, these remain current until signed certificates from the next equivalent program are released. Wide variations in some data sets suggest there is considerable scope to improve laboratory accuracy, particularly for soil chemical tests. Some of these differences are sufficient to markedly affect the assessment of fertiliser requirements. The present ‘Accreditation Committee’, in addition to State Representatives, serve as ‘points-of-contact’ for laboratories that require assistance to overcome problems with analytical accuracy and precision. ASPAC encourages its member laboratories to seek and maintain NATA (National Association of Testing Authorities, Australia) accreditation, in addition to participating regularly in the performance-based proficiency programs run by ASPAC.

1998 ◽  
Vol 38 (7) ◽  
pp. 777 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. E. Rayment ◽  
K. I. Peverill ◽  
B. C. Shelley

Summary. In relatively few years, the Australian Soil and Plant Analysis Council Inc. (ASPAC) has conducted 2 inter-laboratory proficiency programs on plant material and 3 inter-laboratory proficiency programs on soils. The purpose of these performance-based programs is to enhance the quality of soil and plant analysis in Australasia, with guidance where necessary from the soil and plant expertise of ASPAC members. ASPAC’s inaugural ‘Accreditation Committee’ reviewed published standards and existing laboratory accreditation/proficiency programs in Australia and internationally before developing what is now in full operation. This historical perspective and the 12 principles that guide operations of ASPAC’s soil and plant proficiency programs are described, as are the numeric procedures used to determine satisfactory performance. Certificates are issued to successful laboratories on completion of each program. Moreover, these remain current until signed certificates from the next equivalent program are released. Wide variations in some data sets suggest there is considerable scope to improve laboratory accuracy, particularly for soil chemical tests. Some of these differences are sufficient to markedly affect the assessment of fertiliser requirements. The present ‘Accreditation Committee’, in addition to State Representatives, serve as ‘points-of-contact’ for laboratories that require assistance to overcome problems with analytical accuracy and precision. ASPAC encourages its member laboratories to seek and maintain NATA (National Association of Testing Authorities, Australia) accreditation, in addition to participating regularly in the performance-based proficiency programs run by ASPAC.


1993 ◽  
Vol 33 (8) ◽  
pp. 963 ◽  
Author(s):  
KI Peverill

During the past 3 4 decades, there has been a modest growth in the demand for soil amd plant testing services in Australia. Such development reflects an increasing awareness by farmers that there are tangible benefits from the regular use of soil and plant analysis. Concomitant with these changes, there has been an increasing breadth and sophistication in the range of available services, instrumental advances that permit more rapid analytical throughput, evolution of computer management systems (including computer-generated reports), and a general decrease in reporting time to primary producers. These developments have not always been matched with adequate quality control and uniformity in sampling, analysis, interpretation, and fertiliser advice procedures. There is need for further research and method development leading to the introduction of universal reagents or ion exchange resin extractions, or new test procedures into laboratory routines, to enhance laboratory capacities and turnaround times or to improve interpretation skills. Advances in decision support software are also required in order to refine fertiliser advice to primary producers. The challenge for the future is the standardisation of procedures and maintenance of adequate quality control by the various agencies offering soil and plant testing services. The Australian Soil and Plant Analysis Council (ASPAC) will play a pivotal role in this process.


2012 ◽  
pp. 24-47
Author(s):  
V. Gimpelson ◽  
G. Monusova

Using different cross-country data sets and simple econometric techniques we study public attitudes towards the police. More positive attitudes are more likely to emerge in the countries that have better functioning democratic institutions, less prone to corruption but enjoy more transparent and accountable police activity. This has a stronger impact on the public opinion (trust and attitudes) than objective crime rates or density of policemen. Citizens tend to trust more in those (policemen) with whom they share common values and can have some control over. The latter is a function of democracy. In authoritarian countries — “police states” — this tendency may not work directly. When we move from semi-authoritarian countries to openly authoritarian ones the trust in the police measured by surveys can also rise. As a result, the trust appears to be U-shaped along the quality of government axis. This phenomenon can be explained with two simple facts. First, publicly spread information concerning police activity in authoritarian countries is strongly controlled; second, the police itself is better controlled by authoritarian regimes which are afraid of dangerous (for them) erosion of this institution.


Author(s):  
Nur Maimun ◽  
Jihan Natassa ◽  
Wen Via Trisna ◽  
Yeye Supriatin

The accuracy in administering the diagnosis code was the important matter for medical recorder, quality of data was the most important thing for health information management of medical recorder. This study aims to know the coder competency for accuracy and precision of using ICD 10 at X Hospital in Pekanbaru. This study was a qualitative method with case study implementation from five informan. The result show that medical personnel (doctor) have never received a training about coding, doctors writing that hard and difficult to read, failure for making diagnoses code or procedures, doctor used an usual abbreviations that are not standard, theres still an officer who are not understand about the nomenclature and mastering anatomy phatology, facilities and infrastructure were supported for accuracy and precision of the existing code. The errors of coding always happen because there is a human error. The accuracy and precision in coding very influence against the cost of INA CBGs, medical and the committee did most of the work in the case of severity level III, while medical record had a role in monitoring or evaluation of coding implementation. If there are resumes that is not clearly case mix team check file needed medical record the result the diagnoses or coding for conformity. Keywords: coder competency, accuracy and precision of coding, ICD 10


2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (2) ◽  
pp. 689-693
Author(s):  
Nikola Sabev

Providing a specific level of healthcare quality is an important and a complex issue, determined by the extent of influence of number of interrelated and predetermined factors that act at different stages throughout the continuum of healthcare activities. A final healthcare product is a complex conglomerate of goods and services being heterogeneous with a time-varying result and a pronounced individuality. Thus, healthcare managers are required to put its supporting and continuous upgrading at the core of their efforts, which in turn will result in cost reduction, good collaboration between individual professionals, improved financial performance and, ultimately, patients will be optimally serviced and their needs and expectations will be satisfied.Indicators to measure quality of medical services give an idea of their characteristics, conditions and requirements for implementation. In this respect, quality assurance in clinical laboratories is an important process involving a complex system of planned actions at all stages of laboratory analysis in order to achieve the most accurate results with the aim of achieving the most accurate result, of monitoring the effect of the treatment and prognosis of the disease in question. The high quality of laboratory medical services helps modern clinicians in their practical activities and is a guarantor of achieving an adequate healthcare outcome. The ‘Quality in Laboratory Medicine’ concept evolves over time, focusing not only on analytical accuracy but also on a broader and more comprehensive basis that takes into account all the steps of clinical and laboratory analysis, providing valuable information in the process of making clinical decisions that are subordinated entirely to the cares of the patient.All healthcare professionals under the administrative authority of the medical institution, that should guarantee the necessary resources for this process, should participate in providing and improving the quality of services. It is necessary to cover the entire organizational structure, by paying attention to the optimization of the relations between staff and patients. Healthcare managers should provide permanent monitoring and a process evaluation system at each stage, allowing options for choosing alternatives for a solution and precise selectivity, aimed at improving the quality of healthcare, in particular, clinical and laboratory activities and services.


2017 ◽  
Vol 23 (S1) ◽  
pp. 1266-1267 ◽  
Author(s):  
Barbara Armbruster ◽  
Christopher Booth ◽  
Stuart Searle ◽  
Michael Cable ◽  
Ronald Vane

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 1102
Author(s):  
Julia Witczuk ◽  
Stanisław Pagacz

The rapidly developing technology of unmanned aerial vehicles (drones) extends to the availability of aerial surveys for wildlife research and management. However, regulations limiting drone operations to visual line of sight (VLOS) seriously affect the design of surveys, as flight paths must be concentrated within small sampling blocks. Such a design is inferior to spatially unrestricted randomized designs available if operations beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) are allowed. We used computer simulations to assess whether the VLOS rule affects the accuracy and precision of wildlife density estimates derived from drone collected data. We tested two alternative flight plans (VLOS vs. BVLOS) in simulated surveys of low-, medium- and high-density populations of a hypothetical ungulate species with three levels of effort (one to three repetitions). The population density was estimated using the ratio estimate and distance sampling method. The observed differences in the accuracy and precision of estimates from the VLOS and BVLOS surveys were relatively small and negligible. Only in the case of the low-density population (2 ind./100 ha) surveyed once was the VLOS design inferior to BVLOS, delivering biased and less precise estimates. These results show that while the VLOS regulations complicate survey logistics and interfere with random survey design, the quality of derived estimates does not have to be compromised. We advise testing alternative survey variants with the aid of computer simulations to achieve reliable estimates while minimizing survey costs.


Sensors ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (12) ◽  
pp. 4418 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aleksandra Sekrecka ◽  
Michal Kedzierski

Commonly used image fusion techniques generally produce good results for images obtained from the same sensor, with a standard ratio of spatial resolution (1:4). However, an atypical high ratio of resolution reduces the effectiveness of fusion methods resulting in a decrease in the spectral or spatial quality of the sharpened image. An important issue is the development of a method that allows for maintaining simultaneous high spatial and spectral quality. The authors propose to strengthen the pan-sharpening methods through prior modification of the panchromatic image. Local statistics of the differences between the original panchromatic image and the intensity of the multispectral image are used to detect spatial details. The Euler’s number and the distance of each pixel from the nearest pixel classified as a spatial detail determine the weight of the information collected from each integrated image. The research was carried out for several pan-sharpening methods and for data sets with different levels of spectral matching. The proposed solution allows for a greater improvement in the quality of spectral fusion, while being able to identify the same spatial details for most pan-sharpening methods and is mainly dedicated to Intensity-Hue-Saturation based methods for which the following improvements in spectral quality were achieved: about 30% for the urbanized area and about 15% for the non-urbanized area.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document