Considerations for Defining the Intravenous Administration Procedure for Nano-dose Sterile Drug Product in Clinical Studies

Abstract

The loss of active substance, both small and large molecules, from sterile liquid drug products after contact with an administration kit has been extensively reported in the literature. This loss has been reported to be caused by incompatibility of the active substances with the contact surfaces of the administration kit and adsorption or sticking of the active substance to the surfaces of the administration kit. This paper investigates the mechanism for loss of a highly potent active substance based on the type and design of the administration kit. Two administration kits (syringe/Insyte Catheter and syringe/Nexiva Catheter) of different designs were used to administer a solution formulation of an ultra-low dose (nanograms) of a model hydrophobic active substance Compound X. The Nexiva Catheter was longer with tubing and Y connectors while the Insyte Catheter was shorter with no split septum tubing. Dose recovery from both administration kits was determined using high pressure liquid chromatography. The results indicated that the full dose was recovered from the syringes and Insyte Catheter. However, there was a significant loss of active substance from the Nexiva Catheter configuration even after post administration flush, which was due to holdup volume of the formulation within dead spaces of the Nexiva Catheter. It was also demonstrated that the dose recovery from the Nexiva Catheter can be significantly increased with increase in the post administration flush volume, which further confirms that the observed loss of active substance was not due to incompatibility or surface adsorption. The significance of this work is to provide awareness to formulation scientists that closed system Catheter design with Y connectors can be the main contributor for the loss in active substance, especially at ultra-low doses, and therefore dose recovery experiments should be expanded to include proper flushing of the Y connectors to expel any holdup volume from the Catheter.