The history of Equalis

Equalis started in 1992 as a project called SEQLA (Swedish External Quality Assessment) under the leadership of the National Board of Health and Welfare, the Swedish Association of County Councils and the Swedish Society of Medicine with funding from the so-called “Dagmarmedel”. In 1996, the organisation was transformed into a limited liability company under the name Equalis with completely self-financed operations. Before Equalis was established, quality assurance in Sweden was handled by various organisations or specialist associations. With the entry of Equalis, participants in our external quality assessment programs could now compare their results with others throughout Sweden.

To have access to expertise, advisory groups were formed in different areas to provide technical and medical advises. The first ones were formed in the fall of 1992 and in 1993 SEQLA expanded its operations with educations. For the first decade, participants sent in their results by fax or mail and Equalis staff registered everything manually, but in 2003 the self-administration portal Equalis Online was launched, which was a major relief for the staff. SKUP was formed in 1997 together with Noklus (Norway) and DEKS (Denmark), a collaboration that has resulted in over 100 extensive trials of POC instruments and rapid tests over the years. In 2016, Equalis expanded its operations by becoming the national administrator of the NPU terminology.

Today, Equalis is a not-for-profit company owned by Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions, the Institute of Biomedical Laboratory Science and the Swedish Society of Medicine. Over the years, Equalis has grown in both the number of employees and premises. Today, about 30 people work in the premises at Kungsgatan 113 in Uppsala.

Throughout all these years, we have together produced reliable medical diagnostics!