5 Things Not to Do With ATP

Monitoring

According to the World Health Organization, 1 in 10 people in the world (about

600 million) falls victim to illness from contaminated food each year. Of that,
about 420,000 die. Unsafe food not only causes disease—it also strains healthcare
facilities and can hurt economics, trade, and tourism.

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It’s estimated that food contamination costs the industry about $55 billion a year
in the U.S. alone. For individual businesses, it can range from a few thousand to
millions of dollars. Those numbers do not necessarily reflect other costs,
including reputation to a facility and industry, and the ability to regain trust from
suppliers and consumers.

Complicated international food supply chains help distribute more food around
the globe, but also call for more vigilant food safety precautions at every step of
the supply chain. The outbreak of E. coli O157:H7 in several states from romaine
lettuce is an example of how the complexity of the produce supply can create
significant challenges to maintaining food safety.

Quickly identifying potential contamination sources is a key part of protecting the

food supply chain. Since its introduction, adenosine triphosphate (ATP)
bioluminescence-based monitoring of surfaces and even some products has been
invaluable to identifying possible sources of contamination. Within seconds, food
processor professionals can now monitor safety levels, identify contaminant areas,
and more effectively set up and fine-tune Hazard Analysis and Critical Control
Points (HACCPs).

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While ATP monitoring is considered easy to use and interpret, there are a number
of cautions of how the instruments and monitoring systems should not be used.
The following are five warnings about how not to work with ATP monitoring.

Don’t Confuse ATP with Direct Bacteria or Viral

Detection

ATP is the energy-containing molecule that is found in every living cell.

Therefore, it is a useful indicator that contamination may exist on a surface or
other part of the food supply chain, from irrigation water to farm to processor,
transporter, handler, or retail market. But since all cells contain ATP, a positive
reading in relative light units (RLU) will indicate any cell, and not just bacterial
cells. Furthermore, not all bacterial cells cause disease. And viruses, which are not
technically living cells, usually do not contain any ATP at all.

Nevertheless, ATP monitoring is valuable because it points to areas where

bacteria (and, to a more limited degree, viruses) may lurk. After all, bacteria are
cells, and areas that record very low RLUs have fewer cells and are far less likely
to harbor pathogenic microorganisms. Other tests, such as enzyme-based or
bioluminogenic devices based on specialized substrates, can determine the
presence of specific bacteria, including E. coli, Enterobacter, Coliform, or total
bacteria counts, within hours. Still more sophisticated tests, like those using the
polymerase chain reaction, can identify specific bacteria or viruses, sometimes
within a day. Traditional methods like cell culture may take days to generate
results, but commonly can verify species of bacteria.

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Don’t Use on Soiled or Pre-Cleaned Surfaces

Many users of ATP monitoring can fall into the trap of measuring environmental
surfaces before cleaning, hoping that those readings can be compared to readings
taken after cleaning and/or sanitization steps. While those readings should be
significantly different (hopefully!), ATP luminometers and mostly importantly the
testing devices were never meant to be used on uncleaned surfaces. This is
because it is easy to overload the swab part of the testing device with
microorganisms, which can significantly impact results.

As the universal energy molecule, ATP is found in all animal, plant, bacterial,
yeast, and mold cells. Product residues, particularly food residues, contain large
amounts of ATP. Microbial contamination contains ATP, but in smaller amounts.
After cleaning, all sources of ATP should be significantly reduced.

The test is designed to detect invisible or trace amounts of product residue. When
performing sample collections, it is important to make sure not to overload the
swab bud with too much sample. Some products in very high concentration can
inhibit the bioluminescence reaction.
This also means that when collecting a sample, you should make sure to use
aseptic techniques. Do not touch the swab or the inside of the sampling device
with your fingers.

Don’t Assume a High Reading Indicates Supply Chain

Failure

ATP monitoring is a valuable tool for determining the potential for contamination
and can help improve processes at every step in the food supply chain. Too often,
a reading with high RLUs, indicating potential contaminants and possibly even
pathogens, is interpreted as a failure of personnel to keep things clean. To
counteract this misperception, ATP monitoring can be used as a staff or contractor
training tool.

Any successful cleaning efforts require a plan, including setting up an HACCP

process. ATP can provide nearly instantaneous data to find possible gaps in your
processes that can be quickly and efficiently closed by changing cleaning
methods, protocols, or locations. Far better to identify potential issues at an early
stage than later when pathogens can cause costly shutdowns. Furthermore, a high
RLU indicates that intervention and cleaning steps need to be taken, and re-testing
the same area can determine the effective of those efforts.

Training should include the use of ATP monitoring and the efficient use of data
storage and tracking, which relies on software packages (such as Hygiena’s
SureTrend cloud-based software) that can record trends in your facility and point
out areas that need improvement. This is also helpful when supply sources,
technology, and equipment are changed, which will alter how you monitor and
clean your facility. Training efforts and a quest for continuous improvement
should be an integral part of your facility’s culture, and the data that comes from
ATP monitoring can form a solid foundation for creating that culture.

Don’t Under Sample

A cleanliness monitoring system should be thorough enough to sample every

potential area where contamination could possibly occur. Food contact areas
(direct and indirect) and hard-to-clean areas should be the main focus of your
swabbing program. Direct contact areas are surfaces where the presence of any
contaminant will taint the final product. Indirect contact areas are those where
splashed product, dust, or liquid has the potential to be dropped, drained, or
transferred onto the product. Hard-to-clean areas may include filler heads, O-
rings, nozzles, and areas with irregularly-shaped surfaces, corners, grooves, and
cracks.

A recent study showed that some amount of over-sampling (overlapping some

areas at times) can be an effective way to get robust ATP results and prevent
possible contamination. While Hygiena advises structured, repeated cleaning
schedules on key environmental surfaces and a sampling area of 4 x 4 inches,
certain intricate surfaces in food contact areas may benefit from using smaller
sampling areas, such as 2 x 2 inches. Re-testing is still a vital part of maintaining
facility cleanliness, too.
Don’t Test Inconsistently

Hygiena advocates for the development of a comprehensive cleaning schedule

and map of environmental surfaces, including the sampling of “high touch” areas
in facilities. The schedule should include multiple sampling sites on a surface and
reliable recordkeeping on online reporting tools to track cleanliness and re-testing
of areas, especially those areas that result in higher RLUs. A number of
researchers claim that ATP measurements suffer from too much variability in
results partly because of inadequate cleaning and monitoring strategies.

Consistent testing starts with a solid plan and means to evaluate it:

Set up all the locations, users, and test plans before testing so that
running reports is easy and accurate;
There’s no need to create reports from scratch—preprogrammed
reports can be modified and saved;
Graphs can be quickly converted to line, bar, or pie charts depending
on preference;
Sharing reports with team members in regular meetings initiates a
conversation on improvement opportunities and positively reinforces
successes;
Share these reports with executives and quality committee members to
demonstrate how ATP cleaning verification helped improve
cleanliness; and
Compare these reports to any existing contamination/bacterial
infection data to correlate cleaning improvements with infection rate
reductions.

Consistency isn’t just about sampling locations, however. For consistent readings,
surfaces should be swabbed in the same conditions (always wet or always dry).
This will make it easier to compare data and look for trends that might need
attention.

A successful contamination prevention effort will involve some amount of

planning, training, and evaluation for effectiveness. As the world’s food supply
chain gets more complex and global in scope, an adaptable yet robust monitoring
plan will be essential to maintaining a safe food supply. Reducing foodborne
illness by just 1 percent would keep approximately 500,000 people from getting
sick each year in the U.S. Reducing foodborne illness by 10 percent would
prevent 5 million people from getting sick annually.
ATP-based testing is now a worldwide standard method as a first step toward
rapidly identifying potential reservoirs of pathogens, so problems can be corrected
—and prevented—before they become serious, or even deadly.

Porterfield is a marketing communications specialist at Hygiena. Reach him at

aporterfield@hygiena.com.