Drug delivery technologies

Chaubal, M. Application of drug delivery technologies in lead candidate selection and optimization. Drug Discov. Today 2004, 9, 603-609. 

Modified-Release Drug Delivery Technology, edited by Michael J. Rathbone, Jonathan Hadgraft, and Michael S. Roberts... 

Despite tremendous innovations in the field of drug delivery technology, oral intake remains the preferred route of drug administration, for reasons of patient convenience and therapy compliance. Compounds intended for oral administration must have adequate biopharmaceutical properties in order to achieve therapeutic concentrations at the targeted site of action. 

In recent years, drug delivery technologies have grown extensively that go beyond conventional oral dosage forms. For example, intravenous, transdermal, and implant technologies are widely used for sustained drug delivery over increased periods of time. The type of drug, its characteristics, and the intended indication determine the mode of delivery. 

The aim of this review is to consider the types of medications/drug delivery systems that could be developed for administration in battlefield situations, current systems and possible future developments. It will consider battlefield situations, the medical aid provided, current drug delivery technologies and those employed at the front line, followed by a consideration of some future possible developments. 

TABLE 1 Packaging Needs and Considerations for New Drug Delivery Technologies... 

CyDex, Innovative drug delivery technologies. www.captisol.com (accessed on 16 January 2003). 

Baichwal A, Neville D. Advanced drug delivery technology infuses new life into product life-cycles. Business Brief Pharmatech 2002 1-5. 

L-ORO drug delivery technology, a proprietary controlled-release delivery system invented by ALZA Corporation (Mountain View, California), combines drug solubilization technology enabling... 

Wong, P, et al., Osmotically controlled tablets.Nfadified-Release Drug Delivery Technology, M.J. Rathbone, etal. (Eds.), Marcel Dekker, Inc. New York, 2003, p. 107. 

Rong (Ron) Liu has been in the pharmaceutical industry for 20 years, and is currently leading AustarPharma, a pharmaceutical company based at Edison, New Jersey. The core competence of the company is drug delivery technologies. Before his current role, Ron was employed at Bristol-Myers Squibb (BMS) as a director of global product development for more than 5 years. 

Maggio, E.T. 2005. Recent developments in intranasal drug delivery technology are creating new vistas for peptide and protein therapeutics. Drug Deliv Comp Report, Spring/Summer 34 37. 

Malcolm, R.K. 2003. The intravaginal ring. In Modified-release drug delivery technology, eds. M.J. Rathbone, J. Hadgraft, and M.S. Roberts. New York Marcel Dekker, chap. 64. 

Recently another electrically assisted drug delivery technology, electroporation, was proposed as an alternative or adjuvant to iontophoresis. Electroporation comprises the use of electric pulses to induce transient changes in the cell membrane architecture that turn it into more permeable barrier. Beside the permeabilization effect on cell membrane, it was postulated that this technique induces electrophoretic effect on charged macromolecules and drives them to move across the destabilized membrane [205]. 

Department of Drug Delivery Technology Leiden/Amsterdam Center for Drug Research Leiden University Leiden, The Netherlands... 

P. Kearney. The Zydis oral fast-dissolving dosage form, in Michael J. Rathbone, Jonathan Hadgraft, and Machael S. Roberts (eds.), Drugs and the Pharmaceutical Sciences, Vol. 126 Modified-Release Drug Delivery Technology. New York Marcel Dekker, 2003, pp. 191-201. 

Needle-free injection is an intradermal drug delivery technology that can be considered as a hybrid of transdermal and parenteral technologies. The technology was first proposed in the early twentieth century... 

A comparison of polymer coating and drug delivery technologies in leading DES is shown in Table 3. 

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