Karnataka drugs control department is working to renew its NABL accreditation of its Drug Test Lab (DTL) in Bengaluru. The department which got its accreditation two years ago in 2013 has applied for its re-inspection.

The accreditation of the drugs laboratory is valid for a period of 2 years and now it has applied to NABL for renewal of accreditation. The renewal is mandated to take place six months before the expiry of the certification phase.

Laboratory accreditation enhances customer confidence in accepting testing and calibration reports issued by accredited laboratories. The department’s another two labs at Ballari and Hubballi have now embarked on taking steps towards complying with NABL accreditation, Raghurama Bhandary, Karnataka drugs controller told Pharmabiz.

In order to ensure that all the three labs in the state are NABL certified, the state drugs control department is now ensuring that all processes for compliance are in place.

“The DTL certification of Bengaluru has provided pharma companies to rely on reliable testing. During the surprise inspection by our enforcement wings on pharmacy outlets, the reports generated from the lab eliminates the need for re-testing of products. However, the whole process is a lengthy one and we are keen to ensure that other two DTLs in the state would also be NABL compliant,” said drugs controller Bhandary.

The department’s three drug test labs in Bengaluru, Ballari and Hubballi have helped to analyse around 9,000 drug samples annually which are picked up at random by the drug inspectors. “More over we are part of the Union health ministry’s national scientific survey to ascertain the prevalence of spurious and not-of-standard quality (NSQ) medicines in the country to test over 2 2,000 of the 45,000 drug samples. The tests are under progress and are being analysed at the Drug Test Lab in Bengaluru,” he said.

This project led by the National Institute of Biologicals (NIB) which commenced in April this year saw drug samples being collected at random to the tune of around 45,000 samples from 676 districts across the country. The primary objective of the survey was to portray the correct statistics on spurious and NSQs drugs in circulation in the country.