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The necessity of additional, supporting control of cleaning processes in parallel to the common microbial hygiene monitoring is due to the fact, that microbes of all known kinds are to be found everywhere in the environment. Airborne bacteria are especially able to re-contaminate disinfected surfaces within only a short time. Residues of foods that remain on utensils, equipment, chopping boards or parts of production machines potentially could cause the development and growth of these micro-organisms.

To compliment existing products for cleansing and hygiene control monitoring (RIDA^®COUNT and RIDA^®ATP Detection Systems) R-Biopharm AG (Darmstadt, Germany) have developed a new rapid test system for the easy, fast and economic recording of the efficacy of surface cleaning procedures. ‘RIDA^®CHECK’ Indicator Swabs are used without any additional reading equipment and are capable of detecting low amounts of protein residues on any surfaces within a few seconds. RIDA^®CHECK is able to indicate any invisible film of contamination on any surface which would otherwise appear to be ‘optically clean’ and not detectable by other techniques.

The performance of the RIDA^®CHECK test is extremely easy: open the package and swab the surface with the indicator which is ready to use and pre-prepared with the test reaction liquid. If the testing surface is highly contaminated with any proteins, the yellow coloured cotton tip of the indicator swab will change to intensive green colour within a few seconds. In the case of only light contamination a light green colour will be apparent after just a couple of minutes. If the swab remains yellow after this time it indicates the surface is absolutely clean and cleaning procedures have been successful.

RIDA®CHECK can be used to detect the proteins contained in the remaining foods and therefore confirm any residual invisible contamination on surfaces. With experience of comparing results and corrective actions the test will help to re-train cleaning staff to avoid the contamination of subsequent production batches This will lead to better consumer safety and also minimise the producer’s risk from the financial consequences and loss of brand-image that could be caused by a product recall.

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