Eurofins launches innovative veterinary drug screening
High-Resolution LC-MS allows for cost efficient screening with high selectivity and sensitivity
By Carina Bartz, Dr. Susanne Rathjen, Lutz Hartig, Dr. Scarlett Biselli, Eurofins WEJ Contaminants, Hamburg
Veterinary drugs constitute a complex group covering a couple of hundred active substances representing different chemical classes and therapeutic areas. Not all of the veterinary drugs are of equal importance or relevance for risk monitoring. In fact the relevance of certain actives depends on the nature of the sample, the country of origin, the country of destination and the stage of sampling within the food supply chain.
Today more than 250 veterinary drug residues are included in Eurofins' analytical method portfolio including riskorientated multi-class test strategies using LC-MS/MS (cf. Eurofins Food Newsletter No. 40).
In addition to this, an innovative knownunknown screening technique using high-resolution LC-MS now offers unique opportunities and provides improved cost efficiency in the complex field of veterinary drug residue testing. Compared to conventional screening methods such as inhibitory tests or other biotests, HR-LC-MS covers a large set of targeted substances including transformation or metabolic products with high selectivity and sensitivity. Due to a higher level of automation and the fact that quantification in addition to verification has, based on our experience, only to be carried out for the small number of positive findings, the method is very cost efficient. With its broad range of substances and efficiency, the method minimises the risk of overlooking health hazards associated with veterinary drug residues.
The newly developed method has been validated in accordance with EU Commission Decision 2002/657/EC. In the first stage the screening procedure can be applied to meat and fish and covers more than 100 compounds including all relevant antibiotics, anthelmintics and antiparasitics. Future developments will focus on a screening method covering all relevant veterinary drugs for milk and dairy products as well as a comprehensive screening for hormones and hormone analogues.
Contact: CarinaBartz@eurofins.de