Enhancing Maternal and Child Healthcare Programme through Medical Laboratory Analytical Quality Control Systems; A Case Study of Homa Bay County

The ultimate goal in a medical laboratory analytical procedure is to achieve error free results. However, sustainability is not often achieved due to presence of errors in laboratory practice which in turn have a negative impact on patient outcome. The paper advocates for the use of quality control systems to ensure credibility of laboratory results. The paper is based on the study conducted to examine the influence of analytical quality control systems on performance of maternal and child healthcare programme in Homa Bay County, Kenya. The study focused on specimen mix -up, specimen volume and equipment calibration as indicators. The study was guided by systems theory, pragmatism paradigm, cross sectional descriptive design and correlational research design in a mixed method approach. A simple random sampling technique was used to sample 208 respondents from a population of 505. A questionnaire with a five point Likert type scale was used to analyse qualitative data. Descriptive data was analysed using percentages, arithmetic mean, standard deviation, while inferential data was analysed using Pearson�s product moment correlation. The results indicated that analytical quality control has a positive and significant influence on performance of maternal and child healthcare programme (R2=0.967, F=5444.220, P=0.00, r= 1.12). The study established that analytical quality control systems have influence on performance of maternal and child healthcare services in Homa - Bay County, Kenya. The study therefore recommends that the government through ministry of health should put in place quality control systems mechanism for medical laboratory to enhance the quality of laboratory results.