After a weighing balance incident where the equipment was moved and a bowl fell, how could the facility's quality system be improved?

• A. The SOP should be revised to direct a technician to perform a recheck of the equipment's accuracy.
• B. Data should be discarded and re-measured later.
• C. The incident should be ignored if no error occurred.
• D. The balance should be replaced.

Answer: (A)

When a measuring instrument is disturbed, the reliability of subsequent results depends on confirming the instrument’s accuracy before continuing. Updating the SOP to require a recheck of the balance’s accuracy after it’s been moved and a bowl has fallen embeds a preventive control in the quality system. This ensures any potential drift, misalignment, or offset caused by the incident is caught and corrected, preserving data integrity and measurement validity. Discarding data or ignoring the incident would undermine QA and data traceability, while replacing the balance is unnecessary unless there’s clear evidence of damage or persistent inaccuracy. The recheck requirement provides a practical, proactive improvement aligned with good laboratory practices.