Recent advances in alginate based gastroretentive technologies for drug delivery applications

Abstract

The efficacy of orally delivered medicines can be maximized through enhancing the gastric residence period and modifying the drug release pattern according to therapeutic need. Several technologies were investigated through recent years for increasing gastric retention of medicines. Biopolymers are one of the widely studied materials for increasing the retention of drug delivery systems in the stomach region. The biodegradability, biocompatibility and non-toxic behavior in combination with the easy fabrication technologies has made biopolymers an interesting option to pharmaceutical scientists for developing gastroretentive drug delivery systems (GRDDS). Several gastroretentive approaches are reported to be efficacious to localize the drug delivery system in the gastric region. Alginates are commonly employed polysaccharide for developing various GRDDS including low density systems, mucoadhesive systems, swellable systems, hydrogel forming systems, in situ gelling systems, raft forming systems, magnetic systems. The abundant availability from marine and bacterial sources in combination with its attractive physicochemical nature has encouraged pharmaceutical researchers to investigate its suitability in developing various drug delivery system. The mucoadhesive, hydrogel forming and raft forming behavior of alginates makes alginate suitable for GRDDS. The attractive properties of alginate makes it a useful biopolymer in the biomedical field. This review focuses on the source and chemistry of alginates and describes the applications of alginates in developing novel gastroretentive drug delivery systems.

Keywords

• Gastroretentive drug delivery system
• Alginate
• Low density systems
• Mucoadhesive systems
• Hydrogel forming system
• Drug delivery applications