Thank you for the confirmation at not expect any count in a sterile product.
Any recommendations of references for the incubation test?
Below is a link describing the basic concept of incubation testing for commercially sterile products:
https://www.rapidmic...verage-products
In general, the process is like this:
- A representative selection of samples (entire packages of hermetically sealed product) is incubated in a controlled environment to promote bacterial growth
- Samples are then streak-plated onto agar to determine if bacteria are present in the package.
The premise is that a commercially sterile product should show no bacterial growth after the incubation period. The reason why simply performing a TPC count on un-incubated packages is not acceptable is because the bacteria population may be too low to detect in your product. Incubation is required to grow a low population into a level detectible by streak plating. Getting a "<10 cfu/ml" result on TPC testing of un-incubated samples is not an indication of sterility.
The exact parameters of your incubation testing program (number of samples taken, incubation temperature/time) will be specific to your product. It's important to speak with a process authority to help design your testing protocol. Without a well-designed testing program, it will be difficult to demonstrate that your thermal process is effective.