Your Health Meter – Microbiology Testing

People are very health conscious these days. They wish to stay fit and healthy all the time. To know whether you are healthy or not, you must get yourself tested. Undergoing a laboratory test would let you know how healthy you are. There are many laboratories in and around the country that take up these tests. In order to get yourself checked, you would have to give the urine, blood or sputum to be tested depending on the kind of test you are taking up. Once you give a sample of the same, the professionals in the laboratory perform various tests on it and then give you the results in a particular span of time.

A microbiology laboratory is the one where microscopic organisms such as virus, bacteria, fungi, protozoan etc are studied and tested on. This kind of laboratory would be involved in activities like research and development, microbiology testing, analysis, assays, experiments and research studies. It is capable of determining how one’s body is working. This is why many people go for such tests in these laboratories. Another major component of these laboratories is antimicrobial testing. The objective of this test is similar to all that is stated above but is more peculiar to what its name suggests.

An antimicrobial in general terms is a substance that is used to kill or prevent the growth of the microorganisms. These microorganisms may include bacteria, fungi or protozoan. The most commonly known antimicrobial is an antibiotic. It is a substance released by a microorganism that does not allow another microorganism to grow. The medical science uses this technique to cure many microbial attacks on a human body. They are helpful in treating diseases like viral, pneumonia, cancer, malaria, tuberculosis, etc.

Numerous laboratories perform tests on these antimicrobials to know their effect on a human body. The services provided by these laboratories include the following:-

• Antimicrobial/Preservative Effectiveness Testing such as USP 51, USP 61, USP 62, Ph.Eur. 5.1.3, JP (12), etc.

• ASTM Antimicrobial Assays including Disinfection efficacy.

• ASTM, AOAC

• Method development and validation

• AATCC methods

• International standards

• Custom studies and method development

• Endotoxin testing

• Water systems like USP <1227>

There are a number of laboratories where you can get these tests done. If you wish to know where to find them, you can either ask your friends or relatives to give you references or you can search for them online. Make sure you select a laboratory that is close to your place as it would be beneficial for you to take these tests regularly in due course of time. The accuracy of the tests is the most important criteria while selecting a laboratory for antimicrobial testing. So ensure that the one that you are visiting has good reviews and feedback from the people who have already taken up tests with them. Once you pick on the one that you wish to get the tests done from, you can consult them for your requirements and get them done once you are satisfied with all the details you have obtained.

Child Protection from the Unwanted Elements

It is a common scenario to see children putting things in their mouth every now and then. They do not know whether it is harmful for them or not. This generally happens when they have new teeth coming out or when they are attracted to something. Most often when we want children to take some medicine, we tell them that it a candy. But seldom do we realize that the child might try and take the medicine again considering it to be a candy as we had told them earlier. The risk is always in. We must be ready at our end to fight against it.

We do not have anything in the market that can cure the child once he has consumed something poisonous. So we must be even more careful with such incidents. Everyone tries their level best that this situation must not arise. But you cannot stay around your child 24X7. All hopes turned to medical science for a solution to the same. They discovered something that could have been considered as the last line of defense. This was a package that helped stop the children from ingesting unhealthy and dangerous items. Since it is a crucial matter and involves safety of your child, the package that you intend to use must be tested first. This process is known as child resistant package testing.

There are many laboratories that undertake such testing. Before you use the package on your child, make sure you have it tested through one of the laboratories. You can find a number of such laboratories if you search for them online. An ideal laboratory must consider and abide by the following standards while it is testing the packages:-

• U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (16 CFR, part 1700)

• Environmental Protection Agency (40 CFR, part 162)

• Canadian Standards (CSA Z76.1 & Z76.2)

• European Standards (EN8317 &EN14375)

• International Standards (ISO 8317, ISO 13127, ASTM D3475)

Apart from abiding by the standards, these laboratories must have tested numerous packages for child resistance. This would be beneficial as the laboratory would be able to have a comparative analysis of the package and give out better results. While selecting a laboratory, you must also ensure that they provide you with a professional testing program, courteous, knowledgeable service, programs that would complete on time and results that would be reported promptly.

The same issue can occur in the case of a senior person as well. When they have sight issues and lesser knowledge of the medicines, they may encounter such issues. These packages are often used for both children and the aged individuals. So while conducting child resistant package testing, the laboratory must also test it for senior use effectiveness as this aspect is equally important. These laboratories must conduct the tests at various places such as child care centers, schools, camps, shopping malls, senior centers and other forums where children and aged people are available in numbers. A good laboratory with a lot of experience can provide you with package preference and product preference too in accordance with the tests that they have conducted.