Quality Management System for Service and Repair of SAS Air Samplers

Cherwell Laboratories has secured an ISO9001 assessed and registered Quality Management Standard for the calibration, service and repair of its portable microbial air samplers. This successful extension to the scope of its quality management system confirms Cherwell's dedication to developing and improving its own quality processes to maintain full compliance within the regulatory world. It also further highlights its expertise in environmental monitoring.

Calibrating air samplers to confirm a unit is sampling within ± 3% of its nominal air flow rate and ensure accurate microbial counts requires specialist knowledge. Cherwell has over 20 years experience providing this service for its pharmaceutical manufacturing industry customers. This knowledge and experience is now further enhanced by Cherwell's extended ISO9001 registration. Offering service, repair and calibration of all SAS units within the UK at Cherwell's own manufacturing and service site in Bicester ensures a highly responsive service with minimal downtime for customers.

'The benefit of extending the scope of our ISO9001 registration to include the service and calibration of our microbial air samplers is that it formalises our systems and procedures within a framework,' said Andy Whittard, Managing Director at Cherwell. 'It also reiterates our commitment to quality and continual improvement by improving consistency, methods and performance. We also aim to deliver further improvements within the near future by implementing software systems to aid tracking of customer units, reminders, history reporting and creating planned preventative maintenance programs.'

The SAS range of microbial air samplers includes a wide selection of portable handheld units, including the high speed SAS Super 180 with a sampling rate of 180 litres per minute, enabling it to complete a cubic metre of air in under 6 minutes. Standard SAS units use readily available Contact (RODAC) plates, thereby avoiding costly, specialist consumables. An alternative Petri dish version is also available, as are specialist samplers for Isolator cabinet monitoring, compressed air sampling and fixed installation systems for clean room suite monitoring.