DEVELOPMENT OF RIVASTIGMINE LOADED SELF ASSEMBLED NANOSTRUCTURES OF NONIONIC SURFACTANTS FOR BRAIN DELIVERY

Objective: Aim of the study is to develop rivastigmine-loaded niosomal in situ gel via the intranasal route to the brain by crossing the Blood-Brain Barrier. For the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, it provides a speedy onset of action, a faster therapeutic effect, avoidance of the first-pass metabolism, and enhanced bioavailability. Methods: Rivastigmine niosomal in situ nasal gel was developed, refined and tested with the goal of delivering the medicine to the brain via the intranasal route Rivastigmine niosomes were formulated by thin-film hydration technique, optimized using (32) factorial design and characterized for its physicochemical parameters. Rivastigmine-loaded niosomes were further incorporated into Carbopal-934P and HPMC-K4M liquid gelling system to form in situ nasal gel. The resulting solution was evaluated for several parameters including, viscosity at pH 5 and pH 6, gelling capacity and gelling time. Results: Optimized best formulation containing span 60 (A) and cholesterol (B) with (1:0.5) ratio identified from the model developed from Design-Expert®12 software, exhibited Entrapment efficiency (76.5±0.23%), particle size (933.4±0.14 nm), in vitro drug release maximum (68.94±0.26%) at 8th hour and further studied for its characteristics by SEM and TEM showed stable vesicles. Polynomial equations of Y1, Y2, and Y3 were conducted and ANOVA results showed a significant impact (p<0.05) on three levels. In vivo perfusion studies using rat model showed, the niosomes developed has good perfusion compared to pure drug with 27.2% of drug absorption in the brain at the end of 3 h. In vitro permeation of Rivastigmine through the dialysis membrane showed that 60.74% w/w drug permeated after 8 h. The formation of stable vesicles was proved by Zeta potential measurements and SEM analysis. Conclusion: Optimized formulation had greater perfusion and was expected to have a good bioavailability compared to conventional other drug delivery systems

A cross sectional study on willingness and acceptance of postpartum sterilization by mothers at a tertiary hospital

Background: India was the first country in the world to launch the Family Planning Programme in 1951. Despite this fact, India still lags behind in practicing contraception and limiting family size. Even though various measures for encouraging the usage of contraception have been taken up, the achievement in this field is not up to the expectation due to various social and cultural factors. The aim of our study is to estimate the prevalence of awareness, willingness and acceptance of postpartum sterilization among mothers who delivered with two and more children before discharge at a tertiary hospital.Methods: It is a cross sectional study using the survey data on uncovered mothers who are discharged without accepting sterilization and mothers who underwent sterilization in a tertiary hospital.Results: Total number of mothers with 2 and more living children was 231. All the mothers were aware of female sterilization method. Only 38.5% mothers underwent sterilization. 66.9% of mothers stated willingness for sterilization but not done among the uncovered mothers with 2 and more children. This disparity was due to various medical reasons (pediatric opinion 57.7%, anesthetist opinion 0.7%, not treated within 7 days of delivery 8.5%).Conclusions: In our study, the awareness of female sterilization in women was 100%. 79.6% of them were willing for sterilization. Women willing for sterilization were more in caesarean section (45.4%) than in women who delivered vaginally (34.2%)

A cross sectional study on willingness and acceptabily: PPIUCD by primipara mothers at a tertiary care hospital, Tamil Nadu

Background: Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device is a postpartum family planning method which provides spacing to the next pregnancy and also it helps to avoid unwanted / unintended pregnancy during postpartum period. Our aim was to study the willingness and acceptability of Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device among primi paraous women and compare them as a factor of route of insertion (vaginal versus caesarean).Methods: A cross sectional analytical study was done in a tertiary care teaching institution to know the willingness and acceptance among primi paraous delivery (either vaginal and caesarean deliveries) for the period of three months using the hospital records that a total number of 587 primi paraous deliveries and among them 433 mothers had Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device over the three months period, were taken as a secondary data and studied for their willingness and acceptance for Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device.Results: 82.8 % of primi paraous women were showing willingness for Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device and 73.8 % of them had Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device insertion. Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device insertions were more in caesarean deliveries than in vaginal deliveries of mothers with one child.Conclusions: Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device is a strong weapon in the family planning and should be encouraged in both vaginal and caesarean deliveries. The acceptability of Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device in women with one child was effective and statistically significant at p value is < 0.05

Demographic and clinical analysis of post sterilization failure cases in a tertiary care hospital, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Background: The most common permanent method of family planning accepted in India is female tubal sterilization as it has a very low failure rate of 0.1- 0.8% in the first year and over all pregnancy chances of 1 in 200. It can be done by open method but laparoscopic method has now gained wide popularity.Methods: Ours was a retrospective study of post female sterilization failure cases admitted to the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Government Kilpauk Medical College Hospital within a 10 year time period between April 2007 and March 2017.Results: Over a decade we had 134 post sterilization failures. 71 patients presented with intrauterine pregnancy whereas 63 presented as ectopic pregnancy following sterilization. Majority of patients belonged to 26-30 year age group and the median age was 28 years. 40.3% ectopic presented at 5-6 weeks gestational age. Over 90% of sterilization failures were done by open method and around 35.8% were done during caesarean section. Around 65.0 % sterilization failures were seen within 5 years of sterilization but 2 patients presented as late as 17 years post sterilization. In four cases (3%) failure was due to improper surgical procedure.Conclusions: Female sterilization may result in failure even after years of sterilization. In the present study, pregnancy after sterilization is higher in the youngest age group (15-30) years than for the age group (31-35) years and stabilized in the oldest age group (36-49) years. Open sterilization had a higher failure rate than laparoscopic sterilization. The most common mode of sterilization failure was intrauterine pregnancy than the ectopic pregnancy and it was almost equal to each other. Therefore, patients undergoing sterilization must be counselled about chances of failure; even though it is a permanent method, and to consult immediately if missed period else at a later stage they may go in for rupture ectopic leading to high maternal morbidity and mortality

NIOSOMES AS AN EMERGING FORMULATION TOOL FOR DRUG DELIVERY-A REVIEW

Nonionic surfactant based vesicles which are uni/multilamellar in structures are called niosomes. These vesicles contains an aqueous interior surrounded by one or more amphiphilic bilayer membrane forming surfactant which separates them from the bulk solution, and are also called as supramolecular aggregates. Niosomes, being an efficient drug delivery system, investigations are carried out to utilize this system to treat various disorders, to promote improved patient compliance, lesser side effects, reduction in dose, lesser dosage frequency, and higher amount of the drug at the particular site so as to lessen an excessive contact with the whole body. The Pharmacokinetic and Pharmacodynamic profile of Niosomal drug delivery system vary for various entrapped drugs. Drugs that are successful in the mitigation or treatment of CNS disorders should cross the BBB to reach the brain, as BBB seems to be an obstacle for a large number of drugs, including CNS active drugs. This article compiles recent techniques for the preparation and characterization of niosomes, the effect of formulation variables on its physicochemical properties and discussed about its effective applications in drug delivery

A comparative study of PPIUCD acceptance between primiparaous and multiparaous women in a tertiary care hospital in Tamil Nadu

Background: Postpartum intrauterine contraceptive device (PPIUCD) is a postpartum family planning method which provides spacing to the next pregnancy and also it helps to avoid unwanted / unintended pregnancy during postpartum period. Our aim is to study the willingness and PPIUCD acceptance between primiparaous and multiparaous women and compare them as a factor of route of insertion (vaginal versus caesarean).Methods: 1060 vaginal and caesarean deliveries conducted over a period of three months and 676 PPUCD insertions was done among the deliveries in a tertiary care hospital. A comparative cross-sectional study was done on the acceptance of PPIUCD by postpartum mothers between primiparous and multipararous women among the deliveries for the study period.Results: The proportion of willingness for PPIUCD was 68.8% among the postpartum mothers. The percentage of acceptance of PPIUCD was 73.8% and 51.4% in respect of primiparous and multiparous postpartum mothers. The route of PPIUCD insertion was more in caesarean deliveries (34.1%) than in vaginal deliveries (29.7%) in the total deliveries. The PPIUCD insertion in primiparous women was effective and statistically significant at p-value is &lt;0.05.Conclusions: PPIUCD is a strong weapon in the family planning and should be encouraged in both vaginal and caesarean deliveries. The acceptability of PPIUCD by postpartum mothers was more in primiparous than in multiparous women

CFD and Statistical Approach for Optimization of Operating Parameters in a Tangential Cyclone Heat Exchanger

Present work optimizes the operational parameters such as solid particle diameter, inlet air velocity and inlet air temperature on heat transfer rate by Taguchi method. Operational parameters play an important role in the performance of cyclone heat exchanger thus the parameter optimization is deemed important. The parameters have been analyzed under varying solid particle diameter (300 and 400 µm), inlet air temperature (323, 373, 423 and 473 K) and inlet air velocity (5, 10, 15 and 20 m/s). Results of heat transfer rate by varying the operational parameters have been found from Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software Ansys Fluent. Orthogonal array of Taguchi, the signal-to-noise ratio and analysis of variance have been employed to found the optimal parameter values and the effect of parameters on heat transfer rate. Mixed level factor and L32 array is chosen for the design of analysis in Taguchi. Result of statistical analysis shows that the developed approach yields worthy results when comparing with predicted simulation values with confidence level of 99.5%. Taguchi analysis reveals that optimized levels of parameters are 300 µm, 473 K & 20 m/s for solid particles diameter, inlet air temperature and inlet air velocity respectively. Confirmation test was conducted in simulation and experiment for optimized parameters and result shows that maximum heat transfer rate was obtained with optimized parameter among the chosen operational parameters

Impact of charging rates on electric vehicle battery life

This article synthesizes the sparse empirical literature on the impact of different charging rates on electric vehicle battery life with a focus on popular electric car models. The findings show that rapid and ultra-rapid charging cause more degradation of the most common electric vehicle batteries than fast charging, although this degradation is limited to an extent by battery management systems. The information in this article can aid in planning the expansion of different types of charging infrastructure and be used to inform drivers who are switching to battery electric vehicles

Evaluation of Mechanical Behaviour of Multiwalled Nanotubes Reinforcement Particles in Jute-Glass Fibres Hybrid Composites

Fibre-reinforced polymers (FRPs) are composite materials of plastics reinforced with fibres. Cars, sea, aeronautics, and foundation projects progressively utilize fibre-reinforced polymers. This study aims to study the effect of adding multiwalled nanotubes fillers into the hybridized jute-glass FRP composites and their relative properties. This study uses multiwalled nanotubes (MWCNTs), and particles-hybrid jute-glass composites containing jute fibre chopped layer mats, woven glass mats, epoxy resin, and multiwalled nanotubes fillers were created using the hand layup method. After adding multiwalled nanotubes fillers in various weight proportions, the mechanical behaviours of fibre-reinforced polymers were analysed. The mechanical behaviours of laminated composites were tested using the ASTM standard; the following properties are tensile, flexural, and impact strength. The multiwalled nanotubes with 6% wt. attained the maximum mechanical properties compared to the 2 and 4 wt. % of MWCNTs. The E-based specimen contributes the most to the different types of specimens, with a contribution of 24.21% for tensile, 25.03% for flexural, and 24.56% for impact. The microstructures of hybrid composites were studied using a scanning electron microscope