Purpose Optimise a wipe sampling procedure to evaluate the surface contamination for 23 antineoplastic drugs used in the hospital pharmacy.

Methods The influence of various parameters (ie, sampling device, sampling solution, desorption modes) was evaluated using a validated liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method able to quantify 23 antineoplastic drugs widely used in the hospital pharmacy: 5-fluorouracil, busulfan, cyclophosphamide, cytarabine, dacarbazine, daunorubicin, docetaxel, doxorubicin, epirubicin, etoposide, etoposide phosphate, fludarabine phosphate, ganciclovir, gemcitabine, idarubicin, ifosfamide, irinotecan, methotrexate, paclitaxel, pemetrexed, raltitrexed, topotecan and vincristine. Best conditions were tested with real samples from a hospital pharmacy chemotherapy compounding unit.

Results Polyester swabs (TX714 and TX716) gave satisfactory results for the desorption step for all compounds with mean recoveries of 90% and 95%, respectively. For the wiping step, higher recoveries were obtained using TX716 and isopropanol 75% as wiping solution. As anticipated, most intense contaminations were found close to the chemotherapy production site, on surfaces the most frequently in contact with operators’ hands.

Conclusion Wipe sampling method was successfully developed and applied to real samples to determine surface contamination with 23 antineoplastic agents in trace amounts.