Psyllium and copolymers of 2-hydroxylethylmethacrylate and acrylamide-based novel devices for the use in colon specific antibiotic drug delivery

In order to utilize the psyllium husk, a medicinally important natural polysaccharide, to develop the hydrogels meant for the drug delivery, we have prepared psyllium 2-hydroxylethylmethacrylate (HEMA) and acrylamide (AAm)-based polymeric networks by using N,N′-methylenebisacrylamide (N,N′-MBAAm) as crosslinker and ammonium persulfate (APS) as initiator. The polymeric networks thus formed [psy-cl-poly(HEMA-co-AAm)] were characterized with FTIR and swelling studies which were carried out as a function of crosslinker concentration, time, pH and [NaCl] of the swelling medium. The swelling kinetics of the hydrogels and in vitro release dynamics of model drug (tetracycline hydrochloride) from these hydrogels has been studied for the evaluation of swelling mechanism and drug release mechanism from the hydrogels. The values of the diffusion exponent ‘n’ have been obtained 0.5 for both swelling kinetics and drug release dynamics. This value shows that the Fickian type diffusion mechanism has occurred for the swelling of the polymers and for the release of drug from the polymers in different release mediums. The values of the initial diffusion coefficients (10.6 × 10−4, 13.1 × 10−4, 14.0 × 10−4) cm2/min, average diffusion coefficients (22.2 × 10−4, 25.7 × 10−4, 27.0 × 10−4) cm2/min and late diffusion coefficients (1.68 × 10−4, 2.15 × 10−4, 2.28 × 10−4) cm2/min for the release of tetracycline HCl respectively in distilled water, pH 2.2 buffer and pH 7.4 buffer from the drug loaded samples shows that in the initial stages, the rate of release of drug from the hydrogels is slow and rate of diffusion of drug increases with time.