A floating 3D printed polypill formulation for the coadministration and sustained release of antihypertensive drugs

Polypharmacy is a common issue, especially among elderly patients resulting in administration errors and patient inconvenience. Hypertension is a prevalent health condition that frequently leads to polypharmacy, as its treatment typically requires the co-administration of more than one different Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (API's). To address these issues, floating hollow torus-shaped dosage forms were developed, aiming at providing prolonged gastric retention and sustained drug release. The dosage forms (polypills) containing three anti-hypertensive API's (diltiazem (DIL), propranolol (PRP) and hydrochlorothiazide (HCTZ)) were created via Fused Deposition Modelling 3D printing. A multitude of the dosage forms were loaded into a capsule and the resulting formulation achieved prolonged retention times over a 12-hour period in vitro, by leveraging both the buoyancy of the dosage forms, and the "cheerios effect" that facilitates the aggregation and retention of the dosage forms via a combination of surface tension and shape of the objects. Physicochemical characterization methods and imaging techniques were employed to investigate the properties and the internal and external structure of the dosage forms. Furthermore, an ex vivo porcine stomach model revealed substantial aggregation, adhesion and retention of the 3D printed dosage forms in porcine stomach. In vitro dissolution testing demonstrated almost complete first-order release of PRP and DIL (93.52 % and 99.9 %, respectively) and partial release of HCTZ (65.22 %) in the 12 h timeframe. Finally, a convolution-based single-stage approach was employed in order to predict the pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters of the API's of the formulation and the resemblance of their PK behavior with previously reported data.

A Study of Colloidal Particle Brownian Aggregation by Light Scattering Techniques

Aggregation kinetics and aggregate structure are studied for monodisperse polystyrene latex particles of diameter 60 and 140 nm. The experimental part consists of measurements over a rather broad range of electrolyte concentrations (0.1 to 0.8 M NaCl) and for particle volume fractions 10(-6) to 10(-5), using dynamic and static light scattering techniques. The aggregation kinetics data obtained can be fitted into a single curve with a proper scaling of time and size for both particle sizes. For relatively long times, we observe power-law type kinetics, characteristic of diffusion limited aggregation (DLA). Fractal dimensions in all cases are close to 1.7 (as expected for DLA). The light scattering behavior of aggregates of arbitrary size is also studied numerically by employing computer simulations, and existing models (Lin et al., 1990. J. Colloid Interface Sci. 137, 263) are tested and improved for certain conditions (large angles and/or large particles). The shape of the experimental kinetics curves is successfully described with numerical simulations, further suggesting that (under the conditions tested) DLA aggregation prevails for short times as well. Copyright 1997 Academic Press. Copyright 1997Academic Press