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Asset Management Service
Asset Management Service Bulletin
ASSET MANAGEMENT SERVICE BULLETIN
Radiology Pre-warranty Expiration Inspection Program
What does Quality Assurance mean to you? To us at The Department of Veterans Affairs Asset Management Service (AMS), it means providing the best care and treatment to those who need it most — "Veterans." As a means to this end, we are pleased to offer a planned and systematic Pre-warranty Expiration Inspection Program that will provide you, our customer, confidence that diagnostic x-ray equipment will produce consistently high quality images with minimum exposure to both patients and healing arts personnel prior to its reaching the warranty expiration date.
AMS quality assurance program specialists will test and evaluate the performance of the facilities x-ray equipment prior to the end of the manufacturer warranty for compliance with applicable Federal and State regulatory requirements and manufacturer specifications. An itemized report will be provided on all equipment failing the tests, which will enable your facility Contracting Officer to contact the vendor to make repairs at the vendor's expense.
As you well know, costs associated with repair of radiology equipment are excessive. Use of the VA AMS' Pre-warranty Inspection Program service may well save your facility thousands of dollars. For example: the cost to replace a tube ranges from $30,000 to $80,000. If a tube is found to not be working properly during the pre-warranty expiration testing, it would be replaced at no cost to the facility, by the manufacturer, in accordance with the warranty, thereby saving the medical center untold resources.
At a minimum, the following tests will be performed as applicable; to certify equipment still meets requirements:
- Flouroscopic Units:
Table-top exposure rates
Centering alignmemts
Collimation
kVp accuracy/reproducibility
mA accuracy/reproducibility
Exposure time accuracy/reproducibility
Representative entrance skin exposures
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- Image Intensified Systems:
Resolution
Focusing
Distortion
Glare
Low/high contrast performance
Collimator and camera alignment
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- Radiographic Units:
Reproducibility of x-ray output
Linearity/reproducibility of mA output
Reproducibility/accuracy of timer stations
Reproducibility/accuracy of
kVp stations
Accuracy of source-to-film distance indicators
Light to x-ray field congruence
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- Automatic Exposure Control Systems:
Reproducibility
kVp compensation
Fields sensitivity matching
Minimum response time
Back-up timer verification
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- CT Systems:
Spatial Resolution
Low Contrast detectability
Standard Deviation (noise)
CT Number calibration and Uniformity
Entrance Dose and Dose Profile
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Gantry and Table operation
Laser alignments
Tabletop positioning and indexing accuracy
Scan Width accuracy |
Costs are billed on a "fee-for-services" basis with additional rooms at a lower cost if performed during the same week as the initial room.
Call (908) 707-4301 for a price quote for this new resource saving pre-warranty expiration service!
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