AT the annual New Zealand Veterinary Association (NZVA) Conference held in June 2001 in Auckland the Microchip Quality Assurance Scheme was launched. This scheme was philosophically initiated by NZVA, financed from industry and complied by Kevin Crews for NQVS. The scheme will be administered by NQVS based at the NZVA Wellington Office.
With this in mind however the scheme is open to all practices involved with microchip identification of animals. It is hoped that most practices will embrace the standard to ensure the veterinary profession can provide an open, transparent, totally accurate scheme.
Obviously the scheme requires practices to be subject to a light audit component. The Quality Assurance Practices manual details the ISO compliant microchips, ISO compliant readers, the approved implantation sites for most species and the approved scanning technique as developed by WSAVA. The manual also provides copies of generic certificates for animal owner information details along with certificates for change of addresses, change of ownership and pet death details. It is hoped that these certificates will assist practitioners and will set a standard to manufacturers when upgrading their documents.
A final informative section has been added to set a standard code for practice for database providers as they come on stream in New Zealand. The cost to a practice is $50 + gst every two years and on receiving a manual, reading the contents and signing a declaration the practice becomes a NZVA Accredited Microchipping Centre. Practices will receive an official signed certificate acknowledging them as an accredited NZVA microchipping centre and 10 owner certificates.
The original concept of the manual was also to facilitate the allocation of data base access numbers to practices but this really is best handled by a microchip supplier or distributor. The main advantage of having such a QA scheme is that it provides a documented protocol that we can use as a profession.
This will clearly show to the pet owning public, local government and legislators that veterinarians as a group can and will accurately perform to permanently identify animals with microchips.
