Global Leaders in Food Safety Testing
The Innovate Autosampler III from Hygiena has been named Product of the Year at the Applied Microbiology International Awards in a glittering ceremony at London’s Science Museum on November 29th, 2022.
How can they test the frying oil quickly and easily? With OleoTest - a fast and easy-to-use method that determines the degree of alteration of the oil and can be used by the staff of hotel, restaurant and catering establishments to ensure that the oil is still suitable for use. In less than two minutes, OleoTest will provide results, identifying the percentage of polar compounds that the oil contains and if it is time to change it.
Because the research institute has many scientists working to stay safe while researching the virus, it was vital to keep surfaces as clean as possible, generating the lowest RLU values. Principle also demonstrated how the data from the EnSURE™ Touch and UltraSnap™ devices helped validate that cleaning worked – moving forward, they can show any client proactively how clean a surface really is.
Total protein indicators or total protein swabs are designed to detect protein on equipment surfaces. They cannot discriminate between allergenic and non-allergenic proteins, but the rationale is, if a surface is protein-free, it is reasonable to infer that it will also be allergen-free. The swabs are easy to use, sensitive, cost-effective and practical if you are controlling multiple allergens.
Allergen-specific lateral flow devices, when used with care, are a valuable tool to assess the efficacy of cleaning and to screen raw ingredients where appropriate.
Commonly used allergen detection methods can be divided into two groups: There are those that are carried out in a laboratory using specialized equipment, and those that can be performed onsite using little or no specialized equipment.
Validation is the process of gathering evidence to prove that a cleaning regime can effectively and repeatedly remove allergen soils. It is ideally carried out prior to implementation of the regime, essentially to demonstrate that the cleaning objectives have been met. Verification, on the other hand, proves that the validated allergen cleaning regime was performed correctly and remains effective, which is why it is carried out on an ongoing basis.
How clean do you want your equipment to be after cleaning? Do you want it to remove all detectable allergenic residue or do you simply want your equipment to be visually clean? After having carried out a thorough risk assessment review throughout the entire manufacturing process, the next step is to choose the right methods to effectively carry out your allergen cleaning regime.
An allergen management plan is an organization’s formal documented plan, describing all the controls and processes that should be in place in order to be able to manage allergens, from start to finish. Typically, allergens need to be controlled at multiple stages of manufacturing: from ordering and receiving ingoing ingredients through to final product packing.
Food allergies are abnormal hypersensitivity reactions to an otherwise harmless protein in food. They are a growing global public health concern, which can occasionally even lead to death. Likewise, food intolerances such as glucose intolerance can include a broad spectrum of reactions. Then there are illnesses such as coeliac disease – a lifelong autoimmune systemic disorder triggered by gluten found in barley, rye and wheat.
