Competency of malaria laboratory diagnosis at national and provincial levels at the beginning of malaria post-elimination phase, China

Table 1 Scoring schedule for malaria microscopy and NAAT quality assessment

Malaria microscopy^a			NAAT
Score	Species identification	Parasite counting	Score	Positive specimens	Negative specimens
3	Expected Plasmodium species	± 25% from reference count	2	Genus and species correctly identified	No Plasmodium nucleic acid detected
1	Expected Plasmodium species + other species	± 50% from reference count	1	Only Plasmodium genus identified	–
0	Any other response	< ± 25% or > ± 50% from reference count	0	(a) Correct genus but wrong species (b) Indeterminate result	Indeterminate result
Not scored	P. knowlesi	–	− 1	(a) No Plasmodium nucleic acid detected (b) P. falciparum nucleic acid not detected (relevant for labs doing P. falciparum identification only)	Plasmodium nucleic acid present

^aThe scoring schedule for malaria microscopy is from WHO External Quality Assessment Programme, with minor modification from Malaria Microscopy Quality Assurance Manual–Version 2 [17]

ISSN: 1475-2875