The microbial quality aspects and decontamination approaches for the herbal medicinal plants and products: An in-depth review

© 2016 Bentham Science Publishers. Background: The present review article provides an overview of the published literature concerning microbial quality of medicinal plants and products and their decontamination methods. It is important to analyze different aspects regarding the cultivation, growing, harvesting, storage, manufacturing, and decontamination of medicinal plant products. Herbal medicinal plants bear a massive microbial load leading to contamination and mycotoxin, which needs to be considered, and properly controlled using suitable sterilization and decontamination methods. Methods: The main focus of this review is on the definition, advantages, disadvantages and applications of decontamination methods, particularly to show that one must consider the characteristics of the initial sample to be decontaminated. Results: The effects of various methods (ozone, plasma, irradiation) on medicinal herbs and products treated for microbiological decontamination are dependent on factors related to microbial load (i.e., nature and amount of initial contamination), herb/product matrix (i.e., complexity of chemical composition, physical state - solid or liquid) and treatment conditions (i.e., time, irradiation dose, absence or presence of oxygen). In addition, it is important to accept some loss of the chemical compounds, while decreasing microbial load to acceptable limits according to official herbal pharmacopoeias and literature, thus ensuring a final product with quality, safety and therapeutic efficacy. Conclusion: The conclusion, which comes from this contribution, is that herbal medicine has more contaminants than a chemically welldefined drug, thus, good manufacturing practices should be followed

Hydrogel based drug delivery systems: A review with special emphasis on challenges associated with decontamination of hydrogels and biomaterials

© 2017 Bentham Science Publishers. Background: Many researches involving the development of new techniques and biomaterials to formulate a suitable drug delivery system and tissue engineering have been conducted. The majority of published literature from these researches emphasizes the production and materials characterization. The safety aspect of hydrogels and biomaterials is a major constraint in their biological applications. Objective: The present review article aimed to summarize various literatures that encompass the difficulties encountered with decontamination and sterilization methods in the preparations of biomaterials and especially hydrogels for biological applications. Method: We searched for original and review articles from various indexed journals reporting applications of hydrogels and biomaterials in drug delivery systems and the importance of decontamination process for hydrogel containing preparations based on various patents evidences. Results: Despite the vast literature available, limited information regarding the decontamination and sterilization processes related to hydrogels and biomaterials is reported. Sterilization processes to hydrogels are not yet fully explored. Researchers working on hydrogel based systems can consider decontamination of such biomaterial as an important tool to allow for commercialization within the chemical, herbal or pharmaceutical industries. Conclusion: Unfortunately, till date, limited papers are available which reported the challenges associated with decontamination methods to prepare hydrogels and biomaterials for biological applications. In conclusion, each case of biomaterial requires individual consideration to decontamination and/or sterilization. This must be submitted to a specific method, but more than one technique can be involved. Physicochemical and biological alterations must be avoided and evaluated by the appropriate assays method. Furthermore, it is also important to consider that each method must be validated depending upon the process variables

Preparation and characterization of metoprolol tartrate containing matrix type transdermal drug delivery system

© 2016, Controlled Release Society. The present study aimed to develop matrix-type transdermal drug delivery system (TDDS) of metoprolol tartrate using polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP) and polyvinyl alcohol (PVA). The transdermal films were evaluated for physical parameters, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy analysis (FTIR), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), in vitro drug release, in vitro skin permeability, skin irritation test and stability studies. The films were found to be tough, non-sticky, easily moldable and possess good tensile strength. As the concentration of PVA was increased, the tensile strength of the films was also increased. Results of FTIR spectroscopy and DSC revealed the absence of any drug-polymer interactions. In vitro release of metoprolol followed zero-order kinetics and the mechanism of release was found to be diffusion rate controlled. In vitro release studies of metoprolol using Keshary-Chein (vertical diffusion cell) indicated 65.5 % drug was released in 24 h. In vitro skin permeation of metoprolol transdermal films showed 58.13 % of the drug was released after 24 h. In vitro skin permeation of metoprolol followed zero-order kinetics in selected formulations. The mechanism of release was found to be diffusion rate controlled. In a 22-day skin irritation test, tested formulation of transdermal films did not exhibit any allergic reactions, inflammation, or contact dermatitis. The transdermal films showed good stability in the 180-day stability study. It can be concluded that the TDDS of MPT can help in bypassing the first-pass effect and will provide patient improved compliance, without sacrificing the therapeutic advantages of the drugs

Performance Survey and Comparison Between Rapid Sterility Testing Method and Pharmacopoeia Sterility Test

© 2017, The Author(s). The sterility test described in pharmacopoeial compendia requires a 14-day incubation period to obtain a valid analytical result. Therefore, the use of alternative methods to evaluate the sterility of pharmaceuticals, such as the BacT/Alert® 3D system, is particularly interesting, because it allows a reduced incubation period and lower associated costs. Considering that the BacT/Alert® 3D system offers several culture media formulations developed for this microbial detection system, the present study was aimed to evaluate and compare the performance of BacT/Alert® 3D with the pharmacopoeial sterility test. There was no significant difference between the ability of the culture media to allow detection of microbial contamination. However, the rapid sterility testing method allowed a more rapid detection of the challenge microorganisms, which indicates that the system is a viable alternative for assessing the sterility of injectable products

Evaluation of an Amplified ATP Bioluminescence Method for Rapid Sterility Testing of Large Volume Parenteral

© 2018, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature. The sterility test described in pharmacopeial compendia requires a 14-day incubation period to obtain a valid analytical result. Therefore, the use of alternative methods to evaluate the sterility of pharmaceuticals, such as the Celsis AKuScreen™ Advance™ system, is particularly interesting because it allows a reduced incubation period and higher efficiency. The present study was aimed to evaluate and compare the performance of Celsis AKuScreen™ Advance™ system with the pharmacopeial sterility test. There was no significant difference between the ability of detection of microbial contamination observed within pharmacopeial method and test method. The Celsis AKuScreen™ Advance™ system allowed a faster detection of the challenge microorganisms, which indicates that the system is a viable alternative for assessing the sterility of injectable products