Small Laboratory TNI Standard Implementation Series

10 Webcasts

The NELAC Institute, in cooperation with Advanced Systems, Inc., produced a series of (10) 2-hour webinars that show how to implement the Standard. All size laboratories can implement the 2009/2016 TNI Environmental Laboratory Standard. The key is understanding the Standard and documenting what you do in your everyday work.

Running a laboratory is more than just performing the method. There are other operations that require management such as buying supplies, handling customer inquiries, receiving and disposing of samples, ensuring the competency of personnel, and keeping equipment running, plus others. What is needed and how these operations are performed is up to you.

Do you want to make sure you have considered all parts of the operation? Then use the TNI Environmental Laboratory Standard as your road map.

You may choose to register for individual courses or all 10 at a discount.

Part 1 – You Can Do It!
A small laboratory can meet the TNI Environmental Laboratory requirements without hiring a full-time consultant. Working in the laboratory is more than just following the method. The laboratory staff knows how to manage the work, but does not always think about what is involved in performing the method. The TNI Standard provides one place to find the requirements and think about how to manage the work. Whether required or not, the Standard is developed by laboratory personnel. These are not requirements developed and interpreted by solely government personnel. This is a consensus process to develop requirements for not only laboratories, but also for assessors and accreditation bodies.

Part 2 – The Management Requirements
The second part of the series will review what the Standard requires for policies and procedures to support running the method. These requirements manage feedback mechanisms from staff, clients and others. These items require the laboratory to describe the organization and management of the operation, how to purchase from suppliers and contract with clients, and control work when it does not meet regulatory or method requirements. 

Part 3 – Management of Ethics
The third part of the series will review how to manage the work environment to ensure work is done in an ethical manner. It starts with a policy, but the climate or culture of the laboratory has more influence and can often make the policy ineffective. The management defines the culture. Management must have open discussions of technical and non-technical matters. It must encourage understanding of the requirements and communicate in a documented manner so miscommunication is minimized. When an inappropriate practice is suspected, how the management investigates the activity and handles the matter establishes the climate.

Part 4 – Personnel
The fourth part of the series will present management and staff responsibilities, training needs, skills, and demonstration of capability. Management must establish training goals and then attempt to meet these goals. The qualifications for the technical manager and the job descriptions for all staff are presented in the Additional Requirements section. In addition, the contents and what must be included in data integrity training is defined in this section.

Part 5 – Sample Handling
The fifth part of the series will review the documentation for sample handling and provide ways to conform to the requirements. Any size laboratory must perform sample receipt, tracking and disposal. You can meet the standard requirements in many ways depending on the matrix, technologies and customer requirements for the analyte to be measured. The key is to be sure the laboratory can prove which sample was measured and if the sample has been changed either as part of the procedure or before analysis. We will review several ways that labs conform to the requirements, which most labs perform now, but they lack the documented procedure to prove what is done. How does your lab know when it changed the process and can you determine which samples were handled the old way and which the new way?

Part 6 – Equipment
The sixth part of the series will present the equipment requirements for setting up, routinely using, and reporting results from various types of laboratory equipment. This includes traceability of measurements and maintenance of the equipment. Learn why it is more correct to indicate your traceability to the SI through a National Metrological Institute (NMI) such as NIST. This class will also present the definitions for reference standards and reference materials. The records requirements for calibration, understanding differing techniques for calibration, and calibration checks will be reviewed.

Part 7 – Methods
The seventh part of the series will discuss the various types of methods, such as regulatory, non-regulatory and research methods. The reason a laboratory has to rewrite the method into a procedure and the contents of the procedure will be presented. An explanation of the differences will be provided, as well as when to write a work instruction, procedure, or use a form to record the data and provide the steps to perform the operation. Who and how to write a procedure is part of the training.

Part 8 – Quality Control
The eighth part of the series will review the quality control used in routine testing, including the process to analyze quality control data. What does each quality control sample tell the lab about the data? The myths of perfect data will be explored and the interpretation for each type of quality control sample will be explained. When to reanalyze your data and evaluate short-term and long-term testing performance using statistical process control will be presented. 

Part 9 – Reporting Results
The ninth part of the series will present how to report results for regulatory and non-regulatory client needs. The report content will be reviewed as well as how to decide on what to include in the report. Reporting results with qualifiers and without qualifiers is based on the performance of the procedure and the regulator program or client request. Confidential reporting and having a process for changing and reissuing the report is reviewed.

Part 10 – It's More Than Running the Right Method
The tenth part of the series will pull together all the elements and show why they are needed to ensure that data are of known and documented quality. Many of the elements of the TNI and ISO standards are not considered relevant to small laboratories. All the elements are relevant, but how they are implemented is different for a small lab with 1 or 2 people, 3 to 20 people, 21 to 100 people, and more than 100 people in a single location or multiple locations. This training will explain how all the sections are relevant for a 1 to 20 person operation. Examples are provided on how to perform these activities with ease and understand why each are important to the laboratory operation.

Format:
Webcast

About Webcasts: Upon receipt of your payment, you will receive a special link by e-mail to watch the webcast on your computer. The link is time-limited: you will have full access to the webcast and any associated handouts for 6 months after receipt of payment, at which time the link will expire. Webcasts cannot be downloaded; they are intended for viewing on your computer only during the 6-month window. If you have any questions, please contact Ilona Taunton at [email protected].

Length:
2 hours each

CEUs: NA

Presented By:


Marlene Moore

About the Presenter:
Marlene Moore founded Advanced Systems, Inc. in February 1992 as a consulting company specializing in quality systems for laboratory and sampling operations. She brings together the needs of quality system management, measurement operations and regulatory compliance.

Marlene Moore has worked and managed sampling and testing laboratories for over twenty years before providing her expertise to others. Current work includes assessing for laboratory accreditation programs to ISO/IEC 17025 and assessing to ISO/IEC 17065 for conformity assessment certification programs. Assessments are performed for A2LA, ANAB and ANSI. Additional assessor and auditor training was completed under the EPA Safe Drinking Water Program for State certification laboratory auditors for inorganic, organic and microbiology and as an ISO auditor for ISO 9000. Formerly an RAB ASQ/ANSI registered auditor.