Digital storage of glass slides as an enabling technology for Quality Assurance in Histo- and Cytopathology

Proficiency testing programs for measuring screening skills in pathology are at present largely conducted through a conventional glass-slide approach. At present, the use of new technologies such a robotic microscopes allow to entirely represent a conventional slide in a digitised way (virtual case). Moreover, user-friendly, dedicated user interface can be designed specifically, allowing the pathologist/technicians to «surf» the virtual case from their computer just as they do when looking at a glass slide on a conventional microscope. This article describes how the use of information technology and in particular of telepathology can promote an innovative, computer-based approach to carry out proficiency testing in cyto/histopathology. A computer-based approach should promote a larger diffusion of national quality assurance programs that at present suffer of some organizational and logistic limitations