If you’ve purchased a new pair of prescription glasses in the last twenty years, chances are you were given a cleaning “cloth” to keep them in pristine condition. Actually, “cloth” is not best description since the material doesn’t contain any cotton – the word that most often comes to mind when we say “cloth”. Better [Read More…]
The most common liquid used for cleaning surfaces in the cleanroom is IPA, primarily because of its purity and consistency. Cleanroom operators sometimes ask if denatured alcohol can replace IPA in the cleanroom. The simple answer is No. Here’s why. Denatured alcohol is used for non-critical applications such as fuel for stoves, shellac thinner, and [Read More…]
In contamination control, there are generally two types of contamination problems: complex problems that even those who are dedicated to cleaning out sometimes miss, and outright negligence. Sometimes, an issue as simple as not knowing the proper contamination control procedures can lead to contamination that gets the FDA on you. That was the case recently [Read More…]
Sterile compounding in a pharmacy involves customization of medication mixtures in a minimal contamination environment. Safeguarding against unwelcomed contamination is a tall order because many of the small contaminants are invisible to the eye and hidden as microorganisms. The robust standards established by the United States Pharmacopeia (USP) Chapter <797> for cleaning and disinfecting the [Read More…]
Let’s focus on one of the most challenging cleaning requirements for the pharmaceutical industry – cleaning equipment used to manufacture injectable materials – so called “parenteral drugs”. These materials must be made in environments that are absolutely clean and sterile, because there is no opportunity for the drugs to be sterilized after packaging – i.e. [Read More…]
Let’s focus on one of the most challenging cleaning requirements for the pharmaceutical industry – cleaning equipment used to manufacture injectable materials – so called “parenteral drugs”. These materials must be made in environments that are absolutely clean and sterile, because there is no opportunity for the drugs to be sterilized after packaging – i.e. [Read More…]
The surfaces have been wiped and the obvious question is: How clean are they? Start with what you see. Do the surfaces look visibly clean? If not, the wiping activity is not yet done. Wipe to the absence of visible soil on both the surface and the wiper. Keep wiping until the last wiper shows [Read More…]
In a cleanroom, cleaning floors and walls is like cleaning other surfaces, only more so – larger surface areas and corresponding larger wiping cloths. Let’s start with floors. The same principles apply to wiping floors as described previously in Particles on Surfaces Part 4 – use linear wiping strokes and wipe from clean to dirty. To achieve [Read More…]
Before we address wiping techniques, we might well question the need for wiping. After all, if capillary forces hold particles to surfaces strongly enough that the particles can’t easily get airborne, why the great concern to remove the particles by wiping? The simple answer is embodied in two words: Contact Transfer. That’s the means by which [Read More…]
In Particles on Surfaces – Part 2, we learned that thin liquid layers between particles and surfaces serve as the binding forces between the two. By lowering the surface tension of this liquid layer – typically water – we can decrease the binding force and assist in the removal of particles. Isopropyl alcohol (IPA) – as [Read More…]
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