COLA Inc. and The Joint Commission (TJC) have had a Cooperative Accreditation Initiative (CAI) agreement since 1996. Under this agreement, TJC permits laboratories within TJC health care organizations to be accredited by COLA Inc. to meet TJC requirements. This reduces the duplication of survey and inspection activities experienced by health care organizations.
TJC requires that TJC-affiliated laboratories be subject to unannounced inspections unless the following conditions apply:
Laboratories will have an opportunity to identify certain “blackout” days throughout the year for which an unannounced inspection would be impractical.
For a list of documents necessary for the COLA Inc. survey, click here.
Labs affiliated with TJC will also be required to complete and return a self-assessment, (similar to TJC’s Periodic Performance Review process) during each year the laboratory is not subject to an onsite survey. COLA Inc. will be contacting these laboratories in order to update important demographic information necessary for their accreditation process.
For more information contact rgates@cola.org.