EZ rules: Automatic Selection of Statistical Control Rules for Laboratory Tests. Westgard QC, Inc. Madison, WI: Westgard QC, Inc., 2000, 154 pp., $295.00. ISBN 1-886958-14-9.

EZ rules from Westgard Quality Corporation is a computer program for automatic selection of quality control (QC) rules that will detect medically important errors. The idea of automatic QC selection is that an appropriate level of QC should be selected for a given situation, neither too little, nor too much.The program is supplied on a floppy disk, and I observed uncomplicated installation and performance on Windows 95, 98, NT, and 2000 operating systems.An interactive dialog forms the basis of program operation. The user is prompted for input concerning method characteristics: imprecision, bias, decision level, and expected rate of instability (three level options) and number of …