Developing novel drug delivery systems

I was delighted to come across a recent article on how a Spraytec was used to demonstrate the performance of a new dry powder inhaled drug delivery system.

Titled; ‘A novel platform for DP inhalation drugs’, the article was published in the November 2011 Issue of Manufacturing Chemist, and is written by the biotechnology company Pulmatrix.  It describes how a novel dry powder delivery platform can overcome the limitations faced by other dry powder technologies in inhalation.

According to this article, “Current technologies for the inhaled delivery of dry powder (DP) have some fundamental limitations for broad use with existing and novel drug molecules.” Limitations described include the very low drug mass present in many systems compared to the lactose carrier mass, something that may restrict usage of DPIs to high potency drugs. The article elaborates; “These powders are also generally highly flow rate dependent with respect to their dispersibility, have poor delivery efficiency with typically less than 20% of drug reaching the lung, and have high patient-to-patient variability.”

Spraytec supports novel DP delivery development

The Pulmatrix authors illustrate their discussion using data produced using the Spraytec laser diffraction particle sizing system. These data show how the capsule emitted powder mass (CEPM) and volume median diameter (VMD) of powders emitted from an DPI change as a function of flow rate. From this, the researchers were able to show how a new approach to formulation development for DP delivery systems may yield benefits to patients by showing flow rate independant dispersion properties.

Already widely used to characterize a variety of OINDPs (orally inhaled and nasal drug products), I am pleased to see that Spraytec seems to also be proving its value in the development of some of the newest drug delivery formulations!