Puritan Products has made a recent investment to improve data management in their laboratory with the implementation of a Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS) from Blaze Systems. The system has been installed in our own fully equipped Quality Control Laboratory. 

LIMS is computer software that is used in the laboratory for data management of samples, laboratory users, instruments, standards, and other laboratory functions such as invoicing and work flow automation. Our LIMS is integrated with laboratory instrumentation such as our ICP-OES or Inductively Coupled Plasma-Optical Emission Spectroscopy which detects metals at very low levels, and our new IC or Ion Chromatograph, which is a form of liquid chromatography that uses ion-exchange resins to separate atomic or molecular ions based on their interaction with the resin. The results generated from the instruments integrated with LIMS are fed directly into the system. This allows a certificate of analysis to be automatically generated without the need for the manual input of data.

The indirect benefit of this function is that human error is eliminated, and the process is standardized. This improvement in data management is consistent with our dedication to continuous improvement as required in the ISO 9001-2000 standard. The LIMS enables us to provide our customers complete traceability and audit trails to insure accountability and auditability. The LIMS also facilitates the organization of all analytical results which can be used to perform statistical analysis. Reports are generated using "Crystal Reports" software although data can be expressed in pdf, csv, xml, Excel, Word and other formats that may be needed to accommodate our customers.

The implementation of the LIMS software has given Puritan Products more capability to meet our customers' needs. It ties all lab work to a relational database that can be used to generate different reporting formats, and the data can be used to perform a wide variety of statistical analyses. This makes this software a very useful tool to satisfy the ever changing needs of our customers. 

Since the LIMS is a modular type of system, it has the ability to be expanded as our needs and the needs of our customers evolve. Our investment in this technology demonstrates our commitment to quality and customer satisfaction. It addresses our charge to uphold an important precept in the company's mission statement: Our mission, through empowered employees guided by shared values is to provide high-purity, custom formulated, and specialty chemicals that exceed the expectations of our customers; and to continuously improve our quality systems while doing so. Puritan Products believes the LIMS is a very important tool that will help us exceed our customers' expectations by providing us with the ability to optimize sample turnaround and provide information more quickly.