The quality testing of medical device packaging is highly significant in ensuring the safe delivery of medical devices from their place of origin to the market. Guidance documents such as ISO 11607 provide a list of methods that have the capability to improve the package quality testing of today’s capability. PTI offers inspection methods that provide more reliable, sensitive, and traceable data. They offer in-depth feasibility studies, test method development, and test equipment to bring the supreme level of quality to high-value medical device applications. PTI’s inspection solutions are unique in their performance, reliability, and use of sensory technology.

The most current model, the Seal Integrity Monitoring System (SIMS) 1915+, is the ideal choice for your helium-based leak detection system. Compared to conventional vacuum bubble and dye penetration test methods, packages can be quantitatively tested using helium as the tracer gas that ensures higher levels of accuracy. Such an approach allows a comparison between multiple packaging materials and forms production line settings and stability storage conditions, supporting the entire lifecycle.

There have been many advances over the past decade in terms of drug product delivery methods. As a result, key developments like unique cartridge based delivery systems have become common. It is well documented that Helium mass spectrometry is most suited for non-porous packaging such as vials and syringes. The same methodology can also be applicable to cartridge based delivery systems. In most cases the key to success is the development of a text fixture device designed and manufactured to the specific cartridge system being testing. These custom fixtures for helium leak detection can be designed to isolate specific areas of interest in the cartridge system.

Integrity testing of foil pouches offers a unique set of challenges. In most packaging processes that involve foil as the product barrier there is a concern about the incidence of punctures in the foil. These defects (typically called micro-voids) can be created as the foil is being rolled in thin sheets and tiny particles are inadvertently rolled into the foil. The most common defect is caused from the handling of the packages during the assembly of the foil and insertion of the drug product.

A helium based test method for verifying the integrity of a blister card holding drug product has been proven to be the most effective approach due to the extreme sensitivity offered. The test method relies on detecting helium sealed in the package system as it escapes through micro-channels in the package. A test sequence begins by placing the package in the test fixture and a vacuum is quickly drawn. The resulting pressure differential causes helium to escape through potential holes or cracks in the package.

Bottles come in a wide array of sizes and configurations, reflective of their diverse use in the health sciences industry. Typically, they exhibit a screw top closure threaded onto the bottle mouth, though sealing properties ranges from elastomeric liners, to o-rings, to induction seals and reliance on plastic-to-plastic contact and compression. One specific trend is the increase in need to test sterile bulk containers or sterile API containers. As the industry continues to move toward outsourcing or even insourcing through a network of suppliers or sites, transport of sterile drug product or API is becoming increasingly common. These types of containers are traditionally challenging to test, but can be qualified prior to use or as a proof of concept using helium leak detection.

With the advent of more advanced drug development for a wide variety of injectable compounds and an increasing preference for self-administration, prefilled syringes are the largest parenteral package growth sector. In many ways, the prefilled syringe is more complex and intricate in comparison to a traditional vial, a sealed ampoule, or bottles with screw top closures. They have multiple sealing sites that require integrity, but there is also a functionality piece associated: the syringe plunger must be able to deliver a dose, and thus, is movable.

Parenteral products, specifically vials, both glass and, increasingly, polymeric vials, represent one of the most common package systems historically tested by helium leak detection, largely due to their continued dominance as a package system for high-potency drugs requiring utmost protection. The primary sealing interface of a traditional vial system is between the elastomeric closure and land seal of a vial, physically compressed together by a crimped aluminum seal.

Helium leak detection (HeLD) is routinely used and widely accepted for applications that require the utmost leak sensitivity.

Tyvek® gives the premium microbial barrier protection for sterilized medical instruments and pharmaceuticals. Apart from protecting the medical devices and pharmaceutical products from physical damages, medical and pharmaceutical packages also should provide an effective microbial barrier and help to maintain the sterility of the products. Bacteria and viruses with sizes varying from 0.002 to 100 microns are a constant threat to pharmaceuticals and medical devices which in turn can be hazardous to the patients.

PTI's Seal-Scan® and Seal-Sensor® are non-contact airborne ultrasonic testing technologies.  In order to use ultrasonic inspection effectively, it must be possible to place the seal in a direct line between a pair of transducers and move it (or move the transducers) along the seal. The ultrasound is transmitted and reflected at the transition from one media to the next. The greater the acoustic difference between mediums (most evident at a gas to solid transition) the more sound is reflected and the less sound transmitted through. The variation of the material thickness has only a minor effect.

VeriPac FLEX Systems are versatile non-destructive package inspection systems designed for pouches and other flexible packaging.

VeriPac 355 is a non-destructive micro leak detection system for container closure integrity and package integrity testing for a wide range of products and packaging formats. This system is specifically designed to test containers for gas leaks for dry products (lyophilized vials, powder filled) as well test for liquid leaks (non-protein based liquid filled vials, prefilled syringes). The VeriPac 355 can be incorporated into protocols at any point in the handling process as it is non-destructive and requires no sample preparation. With the capability to detect leak rates as low as 0.2 cc/min, depending on packaging specifications, the VeriPac 355 is the optimal non-destructive quantitative test method for many pharmaceutical and food applications.

The VeriPac 410 inspection system offers non-destructive seal and leak detection for blister packs, sachets, and pouches with low headspace including transdermal patch packaging

Multicavity blister packs and low headspace packaging use a variety of test methods to determine package integrity, with most being destructive, subjective, and unreliable.

A variety of test methods exist to challenge package quality and performance. The goal of a feasibility study is to assure that the right technology and test method are applied to each product application to provide accurate, sensitive, and reliable data for definitive package integrity verification.

Seal-Scan® is an Airborne Ultrasonic Technology (ABUS) that inspects and analyzes pouch seals non-destructively offline.  Seal-Scan® is a deterministic, quantitative, high resolution method that inspects pouch seals for defects and seal integrity for consistency.  Testing is non-destructive, non-invasive, and requires no sample preparation. Seal-Scan® provides advanced digital imaging software tools for process control which offers in-depth seal quality analysis.

The VeriPac 410 utilizes a combination of vacuum decay technology and differential force measurement to identify defective packages. Multiple packages can be tested in a single test cycle, and the 410 identifies which package or cavity is defective. 

Complementing the high cost of medical device manufacturing, there is a high value placed on the sterility and quality of the final product which are the main reasons for successful integration of Seal-Scan® airborne ultrasound seal inspection for medical device packaging.

Seal-Sensor™ utilizes ultrasound technology that provides non-contact seal inspection solutions for offline laboratory use and high speed 100% online applications. Seal-Sensor is a very rapid, reliable method that provides an instant reading of seal presence and quality.