Quality assured
sample to interpretation

Vision

EMQN believes that every patient should have the most accurate genomic test result possible. After all, lives may depend on a correct diagnosis to identify appropriate treatment or prognosis. Families also rely on test results to understand the risks to themselves and their loved ones.

Mission

EMQN provides quality assurance tools and knowledge to the human genomic testing community through External Quality Assessment (EQA) schemes. This guarantees the best possible molecular diagnostic procedure, analytical performance, and clinical interpretation.

Furthermore, EMQN’s highly qualified peer group of assessors take pride in their thought leadership position and are committed to regularly publishing best practice guidelines and other information for the molecular diagnostics field

Successful pilot of Huntington disease
EQA scheme

1997

EMQN was established in Manchester, UK

1998

Supported by a European commission grant

1999-2002

Supported by subscriptions from EQA scheme participants. Scope broadened to include:

  • Molecular genetics

  • Molecular pathology

  • Pharmacogenetics

  • Virology

  • Non-invasive prenatal testing

  • Postnatal testing

  • Technique-specific EQA schemes for molecular testing, e.g., Next Generation DNA sequencing (NGS)

2002-2021

Became independent community-interest company – EMQN CIC

2021

Organisation

Prof. Dr. Jochen Decker

Non-Executive Chair

SYNLAB MVZ Humangenetik Freiburg GmbH

Dr. Stacey Hume

Non-Executive Member

University of British Columbia

Dr. Anne-Francoise Roux

Non-Executive Member

CHU Montpellier, Institut Universitaire de Recherche Clinique

Dr. Simon Patton

Executive member

EMQN

Mrs. Nicola Wolstenholme

Executive Member

EMQN

Mrs. Nicci Dickins

Company Secretary

EMQN

Dr. Mary Duke

Finance Director

Integral Finance

Mr Gordon Powell

Non-Executive Director

GRP Consulting Ltd

Collaborators

EMQN collaborates with many organisations to ensure we provide the best possible service, including:

Contact us to become a collaborator

Contact us

View our partner’s catalogue

Rfb 2025 catalogue

Pharmaceutical partners

Several of our schemes are fully or partly sponsored by some of our pharma partners, including:

Careers

Our team is growing!

Are you looking for the next step in your career that will give you a chance to really make a difference to patient outcomes
through ensuring best practice in diagnostic testing?

Visit our careers page to see the available opportunities in Manchester.

News

Microbix Assisting EMQN with Novel Genetic-Test EQA Program

December 10, 2024

Read more »

Webinar: Run 13 Variant Classification External Quality Assessment Summary

November 19, 2024

Read more »

EMQN launches new EQA scheme for MT-RNR1 Point-of-Care Testing (POCT) for use with the Genedrive® MT-RNR1 ID Kit

October 21, 2024

Read more »

“EMQN best practice guidelines for genetic testing in hereditary breast and ovarian cancer” endorsed by ERN GENTURIS

September 25, 2024

Read more »

EMQN CIC partners with Informed Genomics to validate clinical laboratory results

September 24, 2024

Read more »

The new 2025 catalogue is now available!

September 16, 2024

Read more »

Sustainability Statement

EMQN is dedicated to following all relevant UN sustainability goals.

Goal #3: Good health and well-being.

EMQN is dedicated to providing the most accurate diagnostic test result possible for patients, by offering quality assurance tools and knowledge to the human molecular pathology and genetics testing community. Of the 1300 laboratories that we assessed last year, 98% fully complied with our stringent guidelines. We assisted the remaining 2% to improve their testing and reporting services to provide the best possible service to their patients.

Goal #4: Quality education.

EMQN is committed to providing a service that ensures inclusive and equitable quality education and learning opportunities for the human molecular pathology and genetics testing community. Our EQAs provide individual bespoke feedback to every customer, along with detailed and comprehensive summaries of each scheme. In 2023, we published three new best practice guidelines and have organised eight educational webinars to support this goal.

Goal #5: Gender equality.

EMQN aims to create a fair, inclusive and gender-equitable workplace, through equal opportunities hiring and regular reviews. 65% of our staff are female, including 60% in management positions, 50% of our Company Board and 53% of our Scientific and Strategic Advisory Board.

Goal #10: Reduced inequalities.

EMQN is committed to providing quality healthcare for all, providing special discounted rates to countries in emerging and developing economies. In 2023, we supported 32 organisations in 17 different countries to access our services.

Goal #12: Responsible consumption and production.

EMQN makes every effort to reduce its environmental impact and improve its processes by reducing the number of EQA distributions and combining orders in single distributions (to reduce packaging), using smart shipping solutions (reducing costs), switching to using predominantly electronic documentation and record keeping (reducing the use of paper), increasing use of smarter technologies such as video conferencing and selecting venues for face to face meetings with good public transport links (reducing unnecessary travel). These measures help to improve operational performance and production, and reduce consumption and unnecessarily harmful environmental effects.

Accreditation and Quality

As part of our ongoing commitment to providing a high-quality service to all our members, we are accredited by the United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS) to the international standard for EQA scheme providers (ISO17043). This accreditation covers all of our EQA schemes unless explicitly stated in our scheme catalogue).

Please follow these links to view our UKAS certificate and the scope as described in our UKAS schedule of accreditation.

EMQN is committed to providing a high quality and timely service which takes the needs and requirements of our members into account. You can download our Quality Policy here.