Bioadhesive Drug Delivery System for a Cardiovascular Drug: an Approach Using Progressive Hydration Technology

Market for advanced drug delivery systems has undergone a period of innovation and significant expansion over the past decade. In this context worldwide market for transmucosal products is in excess of five billion annually and is expected to continue to grow at a rapid pace. Hence transmucosal drug delivery holds lot of promise in the coming era. Amongst various transmucosal routes buccal region of the oral cavity has got optimal attributes for transmucosal and modified drug delivery and has lot of promise and commercial viability. Present work encompasses development of extended release formulation of an antihypertensive drug Nisoldipine using bioadhesive polymers, to improve the bioavailability along with minimal variation in the therapeutic response. Nisoldipine is a calcium channel blocker of the dihydropyridine class. Nisoldipine is an ideal candidate for this work as its bioavailability is 4-8% and has high inter and intrasubject variability in response. Studies include formulation development using Progressive Hydration Technology, optimizing and validating the formulation approaches, stability studies and in-vivo evaluation in rabbits.