PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
International Organization for Standardization Publishes Revisions of ISO 17043
A2LA lead assessor Dan Tholen among team of experts who developed the 2nd edition of the standard.
Frederick, Md (May 8, 2023) – The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) published the 2nd edition of ISO 17043:2023 for proficiency testing (PT). The revisions to the standard were developed by a team of experts who were appointed by their respective national standards bodies, including American Association for Laboratory Accreditation (A2LA) lead assessor Dan Tholen.
The Work Proposal for the revision was submitted by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) to the ISO Committee for Conformity Assessment (CASCO). The Working Group had over 80 experts from 25 countries, which met entirely by internet meetings, from September 2020 to November 2022.
“I was very happy to be in the working group that prepared the 2nd edition of ISO/IEC 17043,” said Tholen. “The working group members were very dedicated to the project, and the digital platform allowed full participation by a much wider group of experts than if meetings were held only in-person.”
There are a few changes in the technical requirements of the standard. However, there are a great many changes to conform with current ISO requirements for common elements in all conformity assessment documents. The revised standard also more closely aligns with ISO/IEC 17025:2017 requirements for many of the structural requirements. Most of these changes will be familiar to PT providers that have laboratories or produce reference materials.
Most significantly, the new document acknowledges the applications of PT in areas other than testing and calibration, stating in the Introduction that PT can be used in any area of conformity assessment. There currently are accredited PT schemes that offer challenges in the areas of inspection, sampling, interpretation of results, and competence of individuals.
Stay tuned for more details regarding the roll out of these revisions and how you can apply for ISO 17043:2023 accreditation with A2LA.
Media Contact: Wallis Shamieh; wshamieh@A2LA.org; 301-644-3230
###
A2LA is a non-profit, non-governmental, third-party accreditation organization, offering internationally recognized accreditation services to testing and calibration laboratories, inspection bodies, biobanking facilities, stand-alone sampling organizations, proficiency testing providers, reference material producers, and product certifiers. For more information, visit https://A2LA.org/.