Verification of the Suitability of the ATP Luminometer as the Monitoring Tool for Surface Hygiene in Foodservices

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to verify feasibility of using a ATP Luminometer, real-time hygiene monitoring tool for food contact surfaces in foodservices. For this, 54 cutting boards, 70 knives, 21 rubber gloves in 4 institutional foodservices were studied. ATP (RLU: relatively light unit) values by ATP Luminometer were compared with APC (CFU: colony forming unit) of swabbing culture method using aerobic count plates of 3M petrifilm. ATP ranged from 0 RLU/cm 2 to 64693 RLU/cm 2 on knives, from 0.1 RLU/cm 2 to 6743.6 RLU/cm 2 on cutting boards and from 31 RLU/cm 2 to 465635 RLU/cm 2 on the rubber gloves. APC ranged from 0 CFU/cm 2 to 166667 CFU/cm 2 on knives, from 0 CFU/cm 2 to 1000 CFU/cm 2 on cutting boards and from 0 CFU/cm 2 to 730000 CFU/cm 2 on the rubber gloves. To express the degree of association between ATP and APC, a linear regression was performed. There were significant positive correlations found between log RLU and log CFU on the knives (r=0.84, p<0.001), the cutting boards (r=0.79, p<0.001), the rubber gloves (r=0.78, p<0.001). Results of this study showed the possibility that ATP bioluminescence technique can be used as the monitoring tool for surface hygiene in foodservices.