NIST Quality Assurance Program (4 Standard Questions)

OMB Control No. – 0690-0030

The NIST Quality Assurance Program for Metabolomics: Expression of Interest in a Urine-based Interlaboratory Comparison

FOUR STANDARD SURVEY QUESTIONS

1. Explain who will be surveyed and why the group is appropriate to survey.

The target audience for this survey are experts from Metabolomics measurement community as well as future participants in the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Quality Assurance Program (QAP) for Metabolomics (qMet). A collection instrument via the qMet program website was developed to determine what particular techniques, measurement challenges faced by the metabolomics measurement community, in order to for NIST to design our QAPs and reference material and data measurement services to suit the community’s quality control and quality assurance measurement needs.

2. Explain how the survey was developed including consultation with interested parties, pre-testing, and responses to suggestions for improvement.

The qMet team consisting of ten (10) NIST research staff members, determined the parameters or scope of the information to be collected. Based on those discussions, a collection instrument was developed that consists of two parts: 1) QA for Metabolomics questionnaire and 2) Expression of Interest in a Urine-based Interlaboratory Comparison. The respondent can respond to a single part (one or the other) or to both parts.

3. Explain how the survey will be conducted, how customers will be sampled if fewer than all customers will be surveyed, expected response rate, and actions your agency plans to take to improve the response rate.

Both collection instruments will be available on-line to prospective participants in the qMet program at the following url: http://callisto.nist.gov/qmet/ This url is for the NIST qMET home page, that provides a summary, description and contact information for this NIST program. Please see Attachment A, which provides screen shots of the information found on the Home Page.

If participants would like to provide direct feedback regarding their anticipated needs for quality assurance and quality control reference materials and data, they can provide information via the online QA for Metabolomics questionnaire: http://callisto.nist.gov/qmet/metabolomics_qa.php See collection instrument named: QA for Metabolomics Questionnaire for the screen shots.

If the participants are interested in Expression of Interest in a Urine-based Interlaboratory Comparison, they can submit their interest and methodological information here: http://callisto.nist.gov/qmet/urine_qa.php See collection instrument named: Expression of Interest in a Urine-based Interlaboratory Comparison for the screen shots.

NIST technical leads will advertise the survey during poster presentations or talks given at technical meetings and workshops. The participants will be made aware of the qMet web site and encouraged to submit responses if interested in the qMet program. Visitors to the qMET web site will also be able to click on the survey link if they wish to give feedback on the program. There are no plans to send out recruitment e-mails for the survey.

4. Describe how the results of the survey will be analyzed and used to generalize the results to the entire customer population.

A summarization of the results received will be shown and discussed at future scientific meetings, talks and or workshops of the metabolomics community. However, there is no intention to make the results publicly available in print or on a web site. The survey results will show interest of the metabolomics community in participating in current and future programs, as well comments on usefulness of the program, and suggestions about future exercises and reference material and data measurement services for metabolomics.