Joint Commission Accreditation: Lab Decisions Will No Longer Affect Hospital Decisions

The accreditation of laboratories and hospitals accreditation will continue to be linked though, but won’t affect the hospital rankings, and this impacts hospitals that are using outside free standing labs for the most part. BD

Beginning January 1, 2009, under new Joint Commission policy, laboratory accreditation decisions will no longer immediately impact hospital accreditation decisions. This policy establishes comparability in the way that a laboratory with an adverse accreditation decision rendered by The Joint Commission or one of its cooperative partners, College of American Pathologists (CAP) or COLA, impacts the hospital or other organization with which the laboratory is affiliated. Currently, a laboratory's accreditation has a direct impact on the accreditation status of its affiliated organization.