Data on the stability of darunavir/cobicistat suspension after tablet manipulation

Abstract

The COVID-19 outbreak is now one of the most critical crises to manage for most of the national healthcare systems in the world. In the absence of authorised pharmacological treatments, many antiretrovirals, including darunavir/cobicistat fixed combination, are used off-label in the hospital wards as life-treating medicines for COVID-19 patients. Unfortunately, for most of them, the drug products available on the market are not designed to be administered by a nasogastric tube to inpatients of intensive care units. Therefore, their manipulation, even if it can strongly affect the product quality, is necessary for the preparation of suspension to meet patients’ need. In this situation, it is urgent to provide data and guidance to support hospital pharmacists and clinicians in their activity. The data in this article indicate that darunavir/cobicistat suspensions compounded by pharmacists using as active ingredient a commercially available tablet can be stable at least for one week.

Keywords

• Covid-19
• Medicament manipulation
• Nasogastric tube
• Darunavir
• Cobicistat