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Background: To evaluate the utility of the process capability indices C p and C pk for assessing the quality control processes at chain laboratory facilities., Methods: In April 2020, the minimum C p and C pk values for 33 assays of a laboratory chain with 19 facilities were collected for further analysis and a total of 627 datasets (C p and C pk ) were compared. In addition, standard values for C p and C pk , defined as the lowest of the top 20%, were obtained for comparison and the indices were used to determine whether precision or trueness improvements were required for the corresponding assay., Results: A total of 627 datasets of 33 assays from 19 laboratory facilities were collected for further analysis. Based on the C p results, 329 (52.5%), 211 (33.7%), 65 (10.3%), and 22 (3.5%) were rated as excellent, good, marginal, and poor, respectively. While the corresponding results for C pk were 300 (47.8%), 216 (34.4%), 79 (12.6%), and 32 (5.1%). In addition, it was noteworthy that eight (C p criteria) and six assays (C pk criteria) were rated as excellent or good at all 19 facilities. Comparison of the process capability indices at the Jinan KingMed Center with the standard values revealed that total protein, albumin, and urea showed trueness individual improvement, precision individual improvement, and precision common improvement, respectively, while the results of other assays were stable., Conclusion: Process capability indices are useful for evaluating the quality control procedures in laboratory facilities and can help improve the precision and trueness of laboratory tests., (© 2021 The Authors. Journal of Clinical Laboratory Analysis published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.)

This article introduces a series of articles on production research in China.

In this study, a multi-level-factorial risk-inference-based possibilistic-probabilistic programming (MRPP) method is proposed for supporting water quality management under multiple uncertainties. The MRPP method can handle uncertainties expressed as fuzzy-random-boundary intervals, probability distributions, and interval numbers, and analyze the effects of uncertainties as well as their interactions on modeling outputs. It is applied to plan water quality management in the Xiangxihe watershed. Results reveal that a lower probability of satisfying the objective function ( θ) as well as a higher probability of violating environmental constraints ( q ) would correspond to a higher system benefit with an increased risk of violating system feasibility. Chemical plants are the major contributors to biological oxygen demand (BOD) and total phosphorus (TP) discharges; total nitrogen (TN) would be mainly discharged by crop farming. It is also discovered that optimistic decision makers should pay more attention to the interactions between chemical plant and water supply, while decision makers who possess a risk-averse attitude would focus on the interactive effect of q and benefit of water supply. The findings can help enhance the model's applicability and identify a suitable water quality management policy for environmental sustainability according to the practical situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In past decades, China has experienced rapid urbanization, which has brought about environmental changes. The assessment of regional environmental risk (RER) is a complex study for evaluating risk associated with risk sources, risk receptors, and risk retardation under uncertainty. This study aims to evaluate the RER through the holistic macro-assessment, and to ascertain management guide for rapid urbanization to diminish the RER. The results of our case study in the Su-Xi-Chang city cluster, which is a metropolitan area that largely contributed to the economic growth of Jiangsu Province, showed that the RER scores constantly increased from 0.506 to 0.817 during the period from 2001 to 2011. Coupled with the current tendency, in addition, scenario predictions revealed that rapid expansion of urban land would cause a multiple increase in RER. However, RER would begin to decline if the rate of urban population growth (UPG) stabilizes at 1.7%. Moreover, when the urban population ratio increases to 78% along the previous trend, a higher UPG corresponds to a lower declining rate of RER. Otherwise, a lower UPG corresponds to an earlier decline of RER. Finally, implementing city cluster plans was discussed to provide a scientific basis for guiding risk management and sustainable development of urbanization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]