Posting this under the heading it deserves: Reporting a good result: why nobody bothers and why they should — one year on Everything below is what sits behind that.
The question about Reporting a good result that I actually want answered is the second one below. The first is context and I have kept it short.
Both are stated with units, and I have said what I already checked so that nobody repeats it.
The opening post put the caveat in the right place and I want to underline it.
Blind submission is worth the extra effort. Have someone else relabel the sample so neither you nor the laboratory knows the origin until the result is back.
Not the answer, but possibly the question that gets there.
Narrowing the opening post, because the general version has more than one answer.
A difference inside method repeatability is not a disagreement. Saying so in your own report prevents somebody else reading it as one.
Comparing your result to somebody else's on a different lot is not a comparison of suppliers. Lot is the unit and it should be in every report.
Taking post #4 at face value and following it one step further.
Pattern across lots: a single result is a data point. Three or four results from the same supplier showing a consistent pattern becomes a record worth discussing. Two results that disagree might just be measurement variation.
Post #2 and I disagree about the size of the effect, not about the direction.
Selective submission and selective reporting are the two easiest ways for a result to be shaped, and blinding addresses the first while a commitment to post addresses the second.
An observation about Reporting a good result that I cannot explain and am posting anyway, on the principle that unexplained observations are more useful public than private.
This follows post #8 rather than contradicting it.
Reports of ordinary results are more valuable than reports of remarkable ones, precisely because only the remarkable ones get posted elsewhere.
Thank you — that answers what I came here to find out.
Worth separating two things that post #9 runs together.
Where you submitted more than one vial from a consignment, say so. Intra-consignment comparison is one of the more useful things an individual can contribute.
Post #13 answers the question as asked. The question underneath it is different.
Reporting a good result is a question about a distribution, not about a value, and treating it as a value is what produces the confident wrong answers.
Recording a reorder result against the original is one of the highest-value contributions here, because consistency over time is what a single result cannot show.
Coming back to post #13, because the follow-up matters more than the original answer.
Genuine question rather than a rhetorical one: has anyone here actually observed Reporting a good result, as opposed to read about it? The thread is long and I cannot tell.
Bookmarking this. I will come back when I have something worth adding.
Photograph the vial and the label before opening. It costs ten seconds and it is what turns a report into something checkable.
I am not the right person to answer the follow-up to this.
Adding the measurement that post #17 says would settle it.
The format we ask for is compound, lot, testing service, method as reported, result, and the certificate figure for the same lot. A report missing any of those goes to the discussion rather than the record.
That is the version I use. It may not be the version that is correct.
This follows post #19 rather than contradicting it.
Do not adjust a reported figure. Post what the laboratory said and put your interpretation in a separate sentence.
I have seen it go both ways, which is why I hedge.
Small correction to my own earlier position on Reporting a good result. I had the units the wrong way round, which changes the conclusion by an order of magnitude and therefore changes it entirely.
Multiple services on one lot: agreement across two independent laboratories is stronger than a high number from one. Our vendor pages deliberately mix services for that reason.
The right answer here may simply be that it has not been measured.
Include the sample handling: how it was stored, how it travelled to the laboratory, how long it sat. A result on badly handled material is measuring the handling.
That is all the detail I have. Someone else will have more.
Where you have no independent result, a documentation report is still worth filing: what the certificate contained, what it omitted, and how fast a request was answered.
Someone will know this better than I do and I hope they say so.
Lot matching: confirm the lot number on the certificate matches the lot number on the vial. A result from a different lot is not evidence about your vial.
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