Low density porous carrier based conceptual drug delivery system

Chronotherapy, a new approach for treating pathological conditions, is based on circadian rhythm. Present work conceptualizes a specific technology, based on combining floating and pulsatile principles to develop drug delivery system, intended for chronotherapy in arthritis. This approach was achieved by using low density microporous polypropylene, Accurel MP 1000®, as a multiparticulate carrier along with drug of choice ibuprofen. Carrier amount and solvent volume was kept invariant in designing this simple system by adsorbing drug via melting or solvent evaporation using different carrier: drug ratios. In solvent evaporation, methanol (M) and dichloromethane (DCM) were used. Drug loaded multiparticulate system was subjected to various characterization and evaluation parameters showing influence of adsorption process. Drug release study was performed in acidic environment using pH 1.2 HCl IP medium for 6 h to mimic gastric condition for evaluating gastroretention followed by basic environment using appropriate medium as phosphate buffer pH 7.2 IP for 3 h resembling transit. The release pattern showed influence of drug adsorption methods characterized by ever changing pore geometry with total release ranges in acidic medium as 10.7–27.6% and final release as 55.6–88.6%. Present drug delivery system devoid of any additives/excipients influencing drug release show distinct behaviour from other approaches/technologies in chronotherapy by (a) observing desired low drug release (11%) in acidic medium (b) overcoming the limitations of process variables caused by multiple formulation steps (c) reducing time consumption due to single step process (d) can be extended to controlled release also.