What Is The Right Kind of Air Control Valve for a Compounding Pharmacy??
“No Contact Delivery” Newsletter
Compounding pharmacies that work with hazardous drugs are required to comply with USP Standard 800. The new standard that was released at the end of 2019 has a number of challenging requirements:
- Air change rates of 12 ACPH (non-sterile) and 30 ACPH (sterile)
- Iso Class 7
- Anterooms pressurized to +0.02” w.c.
- Negative buffer rooms pressurized from -0.01” to -0.03” w.c. at all times
While the first three are somewhat challenging, the fourth requirement is extremely stringent. We expect the positive buffer room to have similar difficult requirements of +0.02” to 0.04”w.c. at all times as well in the next revision.
With that tight of a room pressure tolerance, you can’t use just any air valve.
The VAV air valve with a standard controller and sensor just doesn’t have the required accuracy.
The high precision air valve has the accuracy, but it may not be able to respond to fluctuating duct pressures fast enough to keep the buffer rooms in spec if there is not a dedicated AHU for the pharmacy.
The air venturi valve is the best choice for fastest most precise control.
When using a dedicated AHU for the pharmacy the high precision air valve is also a viable choice.
You know we like to keep these short, but there is a complete and thorough recorded webinar on this, presented by our friend David Enns with Antec Controls here: