Calibration of Evoked Potential Equipment

Question

I have recently started working at an audiology clinic which has a 4 year old Navigator Pro Evoked Potentials machine which has never been serviced or physically calibrated. I think it had a biological calibration done when new. I have discussed having it calibrated/serviced with our local Calibration Service and they tell me they would need it for three days to do a complete calibration. Is this what you would recommend? If not what should be checked in a four year period?

Answer

The most important issue to address is that you should check to see if there are any regulations about calibration of evoked potential equipment in your facility or locality. Many facilities contract with their local Bio-logic distributor to perform a calibration check on their EP system annually, just like they do for their audiometers. Even if there are no regulations about calibration of EP systems in your area, if there was ever a question about proper diagnosis of hearing loss or auditory problem for a patient involving interpretation of test results performed on your system, it is likely that questions about regular calibration would be a topic of scrutiny. Annual calibration, even if not required by specific regulations, is good practice.

Kathy Murphy, MA Global Marketing Manager -Hearing Diagnostics Bio-logic Systems Corp. Ms. Murphy worked as a clinical audiologist for 15 years and has been involved in hearing product design and marketing at Bio-logic for over 15 years, with particular emphasis in evoked potentials and otoacoustics emissions technology.