22 replies to this topic

[shrani]

Hi Eveyone,

Can any one elaborate the requirement for "procedure for sanitizer rotation" please

[Dr Ajay Shah]

Why would you wish to rotate a sanitizer? If you have been recommended to use a particular sanitizer for your operation by a chemical supplier such as Ecolab, Jasol etc then stick to this and you will never need to rotate sanitizers.

Cheers

[Charles.C]

Why would you wish to rotate a sanitizer? If you have been recommended to use a particular sanitizer for your operation by a chemical supplier such as Ecolab, Jasol etc then stick to this and you will never need to rotate sanitizers.

Cheers

Maybe it didn't work.

I agree yr question. A little information is usually better than none.*sighhhhh*

Rgds / Charles.C

[Dr Ajay Shah]

Charles I still have faith in a company such as Ecolab who have spent milllions on research for their pateneted sanitzer and I am sure they can assit with other types of sanitizers. I have good experience of having used QUAT based sanitisers and they are very effective.

Rgds

[Pat-At-Work]

Hi Eveyone,

Can any one elaborate the requirement for "procedure for sanitizer rotation" please

In one seminar I attended in the past, we were told by our lecturer that it is important to rotate sanitizers. The concern is that microorganisms develop resistant to the same sanitizer you use after a long time. Rotating the sanitizers will in effect alter the micro environment's pH, mode of biocidal action, and biofilm cutting properties. This makes sense to me so after the seminar I implemented a rotation between chlorine and acid sanitizer on a monthly basis.

[psunjka]

Pat-at-work, I completely agree. I do the sanitizer rotation on a following basis: 3-week acidic sanitizer and 1-week quat sanitizer, but I like to play with their rotation: the duration and frequency, just to keep my bacteria and my sanitation team on alert. And if my chemical supplier recommends me only one sanitizer I would ask them about their sanitizer rotation stance. Maybe they know something I don't.

[JeffIQF]

I also agree. you must rotate to avoid Microbial Resistance. I use Quat as it's effective for Lysteria but not as effective for Salmonella and Chlorine as it's effective for Salmonella but not as effective for Lysteria.
Here's a good read
http://www.qualityas...ruary-2011.aspx

[Philips]

Totally agree with rotation theory, Sanitizers need to be rotated to break the monocycle of the bactriea that would develop resistance. As a matter of fact, or disease causing organisms at one time or the other develop resitance to drugs and control substances, its improtant to have a sanitizer rotation. Have never practiced it in food producton areas, but i am doing it in a pharmaceutical manufactuting company.

cheers guys

[RMAV]

My own personal view is sanitizer rotation is not necessary. Understand, however, that I am not an expert I only know what I read. There is no scientific research of which I am aware that conclusively indicates the need for rotation. It seems so much of the thought has come from the studies indicating adaptation of resistance to antibiotics. This is essentially apples and oranges as the mode of operation is completely different in antibiotics vs sanitizers.

The most credible argument, in my view, is that a given pathogen strain may be naturally resistant to a given sanitizer. Being part of the microbial population, it is over time, essentially selected out as the microbials around the strain are eliminated leaving the so-called resistent strain to proliferate. If this is true, your environmental monitoring program should pick this up and at that time a different sanitizer could be applied to eliminate the alleged resistant strain.

In my own personal experience in a meat processing plant, I have never seen a niche of listeria or salmonella that could not be destroyed by quaternary ammonium sanitizer/disinfectant (note, whenever I encountered such a niche, I left nothing to chance going straight to disinfectant concentration).

Thoughts? Anyone who can prove otherwise? If there is other evidence, that would be great because I am about to tell a customer auditor to take a hike with regard to rotation (not to mention the person obviously does not know what they are talking about wrt sanitation). Thanks in advance!

[Dr Ajay Shah]

I agree with the comments posted by RMAV. I would like to see evidence from research conducted by comparing rotation vs non rotation on a large trial and results statistically analysed to confirm this. I am sure that big chemical companies who have a team of sanitation experts have condusted their research to back up their views.

Cheers

[David Blomquist]

My own personal view is sanitizer rotation is not necessary. Understand, however, that I am not an expert I only know what I read. There is no scientific research of which I am aware that conclusively indicates the need for rotation. It seems so much of the thought has come from the studies indicating adaptation of resistance to antibiotics. This is essentially apples and oranges as the mode of operation is completely different in antibiotics vs sanitizers.

The most credible argument, in my view, is that a given pathogen strain may be naturally resistant to a given sanitizer. Being part of the microbial population, it is over time, essentially selected out as the microbials around the strain are eliminated leaving the so-called resistent strain to proliferate. If this is true, your environmental monitoring program should pick this up and at that time a different sanitizer could be applied to eliminate the alleged resistant strain.

In my own personal experience in a meat processing plant, I have never seen a niche of listeria or salmonella that could not be destroyed by quaternary ammonium sanitizer/disinfectant (note, whenever I encountered such a niche, I left nothing to chance going straight to disinfectant concentration).

Thoughts? Anyone who can prove otherwise? If there is other evidence, that would be great because I am about to tell a customer auditor to take a hike with regard to rotation (not to mention the person obviously does not know what they are talking about wrt sanitation). Thanks in advance!

....

[David Blomquist]

IFT had a White Paper on this subject ( "Antimicrobial Resistance: Implications for the Food System") that said what you stated. Namely that organisms do not develop a resistance to sanitizers. Some have innate resistance to certain sanitizers.

More important is getting the surface clean prior to applying the sanitizer. More often than not I've seen failure due to a surface that was not clean instead of a sanitizer not doing the job.

Hope this helps!

Dave

[RMAV]

IFT had a White Paper on this subject ( "Antimicrobial Resistance: Implications for the Food System") that said what you stated. Namely that organisms do not develop a resistance to sanitizers. Some have innate resistance to certain sanitizers.

More important is getting the surface clean prior to applying the sanitizer. More often than not I've seen failure due to a surface that was not clean instead of a sanitizer not doing the job.

Hope this helps!

Dave

Thank you, Dave...I think I recall running into this paper some time ago but did not find it in my library. It's in there now!

[Philips]

The reason for sanitizer rotation is due to some microorganism resistance due to continous application. This should actually be done even to cleaning chemicals where sanitations is a requirement.

May be what is most important is to understand the micro organism in our environments. The suppliers of sanitizing fluids may not necessary tell us that we need to rotate coz of business aspects, but its important

[Philips]

If I am not wrong, Mr. Simon, the bottom line is do you have the MSDS that indicates that it can be used in food manufacturing facilities? Cos as long as we apply THINNER as its commonly refered to, it must be a chemical approved for food facilities. I work for a food packaging materials facility and we use it especially in our printing facility, we have obtianed MSDS and the material states it kill jerms but does not indicate that it can be used in such a facilty. Think this will help

[clover]

Charles I still have faith in a company such as Ecolab who have spent milllions on research for their pateneted sanitzer and I am sure they can assit with other types of sanitizers. I have good experience of having used QUAT based sanitisers and they are very effective.

Rgds

Just wondering, how do you know, gauge or measure the effectiveness of QUAT sanitisers ? 

[clover]

Hi Shrani, 

 

first thing that came to mind when I saw your question was....what the heck is that? Haha...it's my first time hearing it. 

 

Hi Eveyone,

Can any one elaborate the requirement for "procedure for sanitizer rotation" please

[Dr Ajay Shah]

Just wondering, how do you know, gauge or measure the effectiveness of QUAT sanitisers ? 

If you care to look at my earlier comment on one of the threads I have answered the question by stating that one needs to conduct research and conduct statistical analysis to measuer the effectiveness of QUAT sanitisers

 

Just wondering, how do you know, gauge or measure the effectiveness of QUAT sanitisers ? 

[clover]

If you care to look at my earlier comment on one of the threads I have answered the question by stating that one needs to conduct research and conduct statistical analysis to measuer the effectiveness of QUAT sanitisers

 

I see. But since we do not have an in-house lab to verify the effectiveness, we just obtain our chemicals from Ecolab and trust them that the chemicals they supply us is not adulterated in any way. Heh. 

[Dr Ajay Shah]

You can request for a Certificate of Analysis (COA) from Ecolab for each chemical product you receive to ensure that there is no adulteration.  Ecolab has very high standards as it is global chemical supplier so you should not need to worry about this.  Secondly check for expiry date for each product recived to see if it matches that on the COA.  Thirdly you should conduct swabs on surfaces that you have sanitised and send them to a certified laboratory and tis will give you the answer.  I hope this should be clear enough to answer your query. 

 

Cheers 

[ebb30]

I found this link very useful. Page 9 has the conclusion: "Rotation of a common disinfectant and a sporicidal helps ensure that bacterial spores do not take hold in manufacturing and aseptic areas. But the rotation of common disinfectants such as those based on phenol-derivatives (except TLN), aldehydes, and oxidizing agents, has no scientific basis. If antibiotic-like disinfectants are used, however, rotation is a necessity."

 

As a microbiologist, I knew that bacteria don't individually become resistant to sanitizers, but my concern was that some sanitizers are better than others against various types of bacteria. Spores for example are not killed so easily, so my thinking was that if you rotate among sanitizers that have different strengths, some target spores better, maybe others are better at getting rid of biofilm, then your bases are covered. Sounds like getting a spricidal and a regular sanitizer is enough, so I will be looking into what a good spricidal is instead. 

[Heffer03]

Hello

 

I was looking through some information regarding the rotation for sanitizer and if it worth it or not. Curiously yesterday I was in a conference and the expert recommendation was to rotate detergent and not to rotate sanitizer.

 

But I can't find any literature that can support this- Why would rotating detergent would be a good idea?

[Tony-C]

Hi Heffer03,

 

I have seen rotation of detergents where caustic was normally used, there was no acid rinse and a short spell with acid detergent was used in rotation to prevent excessive scale build up.

 

In the manufacture of fermented products, as well as culture rotation, rotation may by used for sanitizers and fogging chemicals to assist in preventing any phage developing a resistance.

 

Kind regards,

 

Tony