Microbiology Roundtable

American Pharmaceutical Review has run another in its Microbiology Roundtable features. Here is an extract from Tim Sandle:

Q. In general, what are some of the current critical issues/trends facing pharmaceutical manufacturers in regards to microbiology testing and remediation?

Sandle:  One of the biggest issues is with time-to-result, which is affected by the (largely) continued dependency upon culture-based methods and which is symptomatic by the slow take-up of rapid microbiological methods. Being able to obtain data faster, enables better responses.

While rapid methods will undoubtedly help, it remains that contamination control and good design are the most important considerations. There is little value testing if a given process has not been correctly designed to minimize the ingress of contamination, Of the different routes in, the main one remains people and the way they behave. Be it sterile or non-sterile manufacturing, designing systems and putting in place barriers to reduce the opportunity for personnel to get close to the product are paramount.

The reference is:

Microbiology Roundtable (2019) Michael Reynier, Jordi Iglesias, Tony Cundell, Suzanne Williams, Frank Panofen, Paula Peacos, Tim Sandle, Quinton Inglet, Jonathan Swenson, American Pharmaceutical Review, pp86-91

Posted by Dr. Tim Sandle, Pharmaceutical Microbiology