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POLICY AND PRACTICE REVIEWS article

Front. Genet.
Sec. Immunogenetics
Volume 15 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/fgene.2024.1451748
This article is part of the Research Topic Proficiency testing in Histocompatibility and Immunogenetics: current status and future perspectives View all 14 articles

Proficiency testing within Eurotransplant

Provisionally accepted
Yvonne M. Zoet Yvonne M. Zoet 1*Sebastiaan Heidt Sebastiaan Heidt 1Marissa J. van der Linden-van Oevelen Marissa J. van der Linden-van Oevelen 1Geert Haasnoot Geert Haasnoot 1Frans H. Claas Frans H. Claas 2
  • 1 Immunology-ETRL, Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC), Leiden, Netherlands
  • 2 Eurotransplant, Leiden, Netherlands

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Eurotransplant is responsible for the international allocation of organs between 8 countries in Europe. All HLA laboratories affiliated to Eurotransplant must be EFI or ASHI accredited and must participate in the Eurotransplant external proficiency testing (EPT) program, organized by the Eurotransplant Reference Laboratory (ETRL). EPT within Eurotransplant has a long tradition, starting in 1978. The current EPT program consists of the following schemes: HLA typing including serology, CDC crossmatching, HLA-specific antibody detection and identification. Participants enter the results of laboratory tests using a web-based application. Assessed results are visible on the website. An additional component called "patient-based cases" runs since 2016. Results are summarized and published on the EPT website. Furthermore, these results are discussed during the annual extramural tissue typers meeting, which is organized by the ETRL. Thanks to this EPT program, the performance of all HLA laboratories affiliated to Eurotransplant can be monitored and corrected, if necessary. Because all affiliated laboratories are assessed in the same EPT program, where these laboratories show to be consistent in most of their results, the Eurotransplant EPT has proven to be an efficient tool to create a more uniform level of quality of histocompatibility testing within Eurotransplant.Eurotransplant is an international organ exchange organization founded in 1967 by prof. dr. Jon van Rood (van Rood 1967). Currently Eurotransplant consists of eight member states; Austria,

    Keywords: Proficiency test (PT), solid organ transplantation, Histocompatibility Testing, Eurotransplant, patient based cases

    Received: 19 Jun 2024; Accepted: 06 Sep 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Zoet, Heidt, van der Linden-van Oevelen, Haasnoot and Claas. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Yvonne M. Zoet, Immunology-ETRL, Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC), Leiden, Netherlands

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.