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Company Profile |
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| 1. Micrylium - The Company |  | Micrylium Laboratories is a privately owned manufacturer that began in the Infection Control field in May of 1994. The name is derived from Microbiology and the ending “ylium” is to signify value. Laboratories is essential to the name to indicate the company has a major research (Microbiology, Materials Science & Immunology) and service (Analytical) direction. The head office and plant is located at 5000-M Dufferin Street at Steeles in Toronto. Sanofi-Aventis-Connaught Laboratories and York University are in the area, and University of Toronto and the MARS Biotechnology group is 25 minutes away by subway link. The facility occupies just under 14,000 square feet, and is divided almost equally between a Lecture Facility (Micrylium Centre), Manufacturing, Administrative, Customer Service and Storage of raw materials, packaging and finished goods . Micrylium Laboratories presently has manufacturing capabilities as a fully compliant FDA Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) manufacturer. Manufacturing capabilities are filling of liquids in pouch formats (20 to 500 mL) Liquid bottle and Bag-in-Box foil packaging is done in 500 mL to 6 L quantities. ISO 9001 certification was achieved in June of 2001. Our laboratory enables us to provide services such as Association of Analytical Chemists (AOAC) disinfectant testing, water testing, sterilization monitoring and United States Pharmacopoeia (USP) Microbial Limits (sterility) product testing for Micrylium and other manufacturers. The lab is fully equipped with Gas, Liquid and Ion Chromatography with validated methods. Microbiological experiments are conducted in a special Bio-Containment centre.
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| 2. Driving Micrylium's Ideas and Concepts... | It seems a long time ago now, but back in 1987, a
concept was born from a very ordinary idea.
The idea was to create disinfectants that had kill times
significantly less than 10 minutes. Then and only then would
disinfection between clients or patients become a reality rather than an economic compromise.
Well, ideas are cheap. A friend once said: “If someone gives you an idea and expects to be paid for it, give them a penny or even a looney immediately and you’ll certainly be even”.
What he tried to say was: it is a very long drive to bring product from the idea towards reality. The driving of the idea is certainly difficult. Sometimes there aren’t even roads to follow. When there are “metaphorical roads”, they could be curving,
slippery, fiscally un-supported or even government obstructed.
In driving the idea of faster microbial kill times, the SurfOL concept was born. The fastest product of the group was 3 minutes against TB. The success was in suppressing the evaporation of ethanol. Remembering at that time there was pressure from
marketing to include phenols in the formulations because “everyone else has them”. Contrarily there were the lab arguments from our Microbiologists that phenols were not necessary to obtain a rapid TB or viral kill AND WERE CARCINOGENS!
When we presented a survey of the environmental impact and toxicity of disinfectants at a research meeting in 1992, the next stage of driving ideas began.
The responses to the presentation impacted on us that there was a great level of concern for personal safety and the subsequent environmental consequences of using toxic and
polluting disinfectants.
By examining in fine detail the components that make up
chemical disinfectants we were eventually successful in replacing dangerous chemicals with kinder, friendlier substances without compromising the overall effectiveness of the products.
Newly developed, totally biodegradable surfactants
provide maximum surface wetting and cleansing while enhancing the activity of the antimicrobial agent selected. Interestingly, of the several thousand chemistries available from the major multi-national chemical companies, over 90% of the surfactants were not readily biodegradable.
Safer vapour-suppressing agents, extremely necessary to reduce the evaporation of ethanol, have made these solutions more effective and entirely non-carcinogenic.
Avoidance of all aldehyde products (Glutaraldehyde) has been our priority. Hospital level disinfection can be attained in less time with less personal and environmental impact with phenol-free, ethanol-based formulations. |  |
| 3. Excerpts from the Micrylium Constitution |  | Micrylium will not develop any product that is a copy of a competitor.
Every product developed will be the best in its category when rated by our consumer standards of “kindest, safest, fastest” or by appropriate International government standards. Testing shall be the final arbiter of performance.
No product produced by Micrylium will contain endocrine disrupting chemicals such as Alkyl or Nonyl Phenol Ethoxlates.
All Micrylium products will be produced according to Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP).
Management will be paid base salaries below industry standards and will be rewarded only when overall corporate performance exceeds projections. Management has an obligation to produce a profit of at least 5 % per annum. Should they fail for two consecutive fiscal years to meet this goal, the shareholders will have the right to elect additional directors.
Micrylium has a responsibility to our planet and community. Two percent of the profit before tax will be allocated for charitable causes in two categories. Environment (Causes, Organizations or Funds) and Health (Children’s Hospitals and Sport)
A minimum of 20 % of the profit before tax will be allocated for internal research purposes to ensure long-term competitiveness
All employees are expected to abide by Micrylium’s environmental and business principles. All employees are given the understanding that family comes first, the company second. All employees are encouraged to participate in continuing education in their specific fields and in infection control & health matters.
Employees are expected to be kind, helpful and respectful to all customers and co-workers. They are expected to show a work ethic that demonstrates pride in Micrylium, its products and its staff. |
| 4. Professional Infection Control | - How far have we come?
A brief look at the past years of Asepsis and Disease Prevention shows that we have come full circle. Handwashing techniques and quarantine proposed by Sir William Osler and Pasteur, gave way to Sterilizers, Latex Gloves and toxic chemicals. We have become like Siamese twins, on one hand, vigilant and uncompromising, on the other ignorant and stubborn. In a steadfast effort to follow all the rules of the Gurus, OSHA, and textbooks, many have missed some basics. Hand washing, cross-contamination, surface disinfection and water quality have been ignored by many.
What do we know today about disease transmission that we didn’t 10 years ago? More importantly, the transition from knowing to doing something about it has taken a serious amount of time.
Where were you 10 years ago in Asepsis? Where are you now?
Clients of all professionals are very aware of disease transmission today. It used to be that the word Disinfection was only heard in surgery rooms in hospitals. We all knew there were bacteria somewhere out there, but they never, ever came close to affecting our lives. Bacteria and viruses are too small to be seen, in fact they have to be in millions before we can recognize them as a colony. We never realize the power of microbes until we are affected by them. We all can imagine someone coughing in your face, then realizing three days later that that was the source of your cold. These were the situations we tried to avoid. Then many of us started to slowly realize that some colleagues and acquaintances over time had had problems with disease that were occupationally oriented. How did they get infected? Why wasn’t it obvious at the time?
Reservoirs of Infection
All infections have an incubation period. The most difficult concept for us to fathom is that microbes are truly invisible and that every time we have contact with microbes, we become infected. Now, becoming infected does not always lead to sickness or disease. After infection, our immune system fights the invading microbes with varying degrees of success. This “incubation period”, between the time of infection and the onset of disease is different for all microbes. For example with Salmonella sp (an example of food poisoning) it is only a matter of hours after you have been infected until you know you are sick. For Influenza, it may be a few days, but the frightening aspects of incubation periods are for Hepatitis and Tuberculosis. They are in the range of 6 months. That can be a long period of anxiety if one fears that they have been infected.
Why do we get sick?
There are several factors such as the type of microbial invader (how virulent or pathogenic it is), the number of microbes and most importantly the strength or robustness of the host (ourselves). We all, at different stages of our lives, may or may not be more susceptible to disease. If we are undergoing drug treatments for asthma or cancer, we will have a suppressed immunity. Others who are in the immune suppressed group are diabetics, elderly people or even someone who hasn’t slept well for several nights. The unfortunate reality is that we only find out several weeks or months later that we have been exposed to harmful bacteria. We can’t see them, so in our minds they don’t exist until we get sick. We have learned a lot in this past decade about long term microbial invasion of our bodies. Ulcers, once believed to be caused by acids, have been found in 90% of cases to be a bacteria from the Spirochaete family. Arterial sclerosis, for years was believed to be solely the deposition of fatty steroids like cholesterol, has now been found to be caused by bacterial biofilms. Even chronic fatigue in many instances has been linked to a Candida type systemic fungal infection.
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| 5. Another View - Time for Preventive Action |  | Professional care givers have a fine reputation for maintaining a serious attitude about infection control. In reality, the professions have had to. Clients or patients are detailed about appearance and cleanliness. The links between client and the professional are frequent, and the potential for transmission of disease is great. Coordination and compliance are the keys to success in breaking the circle of infection.
Protecting Professional Personnel
A day-to-day environment that involves the interaction with dozens of individuals from many continents and all walks of life increases the risk of contracting infectious diseases. Serious attention to procedures and utilization of appropriate barrier, sterilization and disinfection techniques has reduced this risk to conscientious clinics in recent years.
Looking beyond the intense focus of killing micro-organisms, concerns have been raised over personal safety of the users combined with a well founded concern for the environmental impact. There are limits to the levels of human exposure to many noxious chemicals. For example the Threshold Limit Value (TLV) of irritation for pure ethanol is ten thousand times higher than that of dilute glutaraldehyde or phenol solutions. The long term effects of exposure to these chemicals is not yet fully known. However, definitive studies have already shown suspected carcinogenic dangers from phenolic disinfectants and vapour-suppressing agents such as Ethylene Glycol.
Consider, as well, the impact Professionals have on the broader environmental stage. In Canada alone, over 200,000 esthetic, medical, dental and veterinary offices dump from 1 to 5 litres per day of "dangerous" chemicals such as glutaraldehydes, phenols, chlorines and non-biodegradable surfactants. Simple math reveals that this would exceed 100 million Litres per year into our rivers and lakes.
Damage to professional equipment and plumbing also adds to the environmental toll. Phenols dissolve ABS plumbing, Chlorines damage copper pipes and peroxides cause extensive corrosion to instruments, increasing costs due to replacement. It’s time for a holistic approach to Infection Control. |
| 6. Personal Safety - Hormone Disruptors | Rachel Carson warned us in Silent Spring (1962) about the rapid ecological upheaval that was being caused by the widespread use of synthetic chemicals, especially in agriculture and forestry. The latest understanding in toxicology is about the ability of some chemicals to mimic hormones in living organisms. This field of study is about subtle genetic changes brought on by hormone disruptors.
This is in contrast to the widely held notion that if a compound is toxic it will knock you out with a heavyweight punch. Hormonal activity in animals is regulated by the endocrine system. These hormones act like messengers relaying information to cells about how and when to grow, divide or die. When disrupted by chemicals, transgenerational genetic damage can occur. In-utero exposure to toxic compounds may sometimes cause birth defects, but will be more likely to emerge later in life at the time of maturity and reproductive prime.
Synthetic compounds such as NPE’s (Nonyl Phenol Ethoxylates) mimic hormonal structure and function, blocking important receptor sites in cells. What is especially amazing about these detergents (which have been banned by ALL European countries) is that it takes only one tenth of a part per million to cause reproductive damage in Salmon. The Salmon stocks are low due to intense pesticide use in agriculture and detergent use in the pulp and paper industry. As an integral part of Micrylium’s constitution, any chemical suspected of being a hormone disrupting compound is forbidden from product formulations. |  |
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