Controlling atorvastatin release from liquisolid systems

Abstract

Liquisolid technology as a novel technique to control the release rate of drugs has attracted the attention of many researchers. This study aims to investigate parameters controlling the drug release from liquisolid formulations. Factors such as the ratio of drug: liquid vehicle, the ratio of edudragit: avicel and the concentration of coating material in the formulations were investigated. All liquisolid compacts were subjected to dissolution testing for 8 hours at 50 rpm in a 900 ml phosphate buffer and temperature of 37 °C. The results showed that adding avicel to liquisolid formulations containing eudragit, not only increased the mechanical strength of the resultant liquisolid tablets but also reduced the drug release significantly. The results showed that the type of liquid vehicle used to dissolved/dispersed the drug was capable of modulating the drug release rate through the capability of solvents to solubilize the drug in liquisolid compacts. Results also showed that a reduction in the pH of the dissolution medium decreased the release rate significantly. It was interesting to note that the volume of the dissolution medium had no significant impact on the drug release rate. FTIR results ruled out any interaction between the drug and other components of the liquisolid formulations. The DSC traces showed that the drug was in an amorphous state in liquisolid formulations. It is concluded from the current study that the type of liquid vehicle, the amount of liquid vehicle and carrier can modulate the drug release from liqusolid compacts.