ABSTRACT:
Topical administration of drug to treat ocular diseases is accomplished primarily by means of solutions, ointments, and suspensions. These are relatively inefficient as drug delivery systems often only 1% of the available drug is absorbed by the eye. Ciprofloxacin hydrochloride is a fluroquinolone anti-bacterial drug effective in the treatment of bacterial infections. Ciprofloxacin hydrochloride ocuserts were prepared using different polymers in various proportions. The in-vitro release of the drug from the formulations was studied using a commercial semipermeable membrane. The objective of the present work was to prepare ocular inserts with the target of increasing the contact time, reducing the frequency of administration, improving patient compliance and greater therapeutic efficacy. Ocular inserts were prepared by solvent casting technique using different polymers such as polyvinyl alcohol alone (4 %, 5 %, 6 %) and polyvinyl alcohol with polyvinyl pyrrolidone K-30, (4:0.5, 4:1, 4:1.5, 4:2, 4:2.5, 4:3) as a drug reservoir and ethyl cellulose (4 %) as a rate controlling membrane. Ocular inserts were evaluated for their physicochemical parameters like thickness, weight uniformity, drug content, percent moisture loss, and percent moisture absorption. The in-vitro drug release studies were carried out using Bi-chambered donar, receptor compartment model. Since targeted prolong release was observed in formulation F-7. The optimized formulation F-7 was subjected to in-vivo drug release study using rabbits as an animal model, Sterility testing and accelerated stability studies to access the effectiveness of the formulation. In-vitro drug release kinetic data was treated according to Higuchi and Peppas kinetics to access the mechanism of drug release. It can be concluded that the formulation F-7 provided the desired drug release for 24 hrs and remained stable and intact at ambient conditions. The results indicated a good correlation between in-vitro and in-vivo studies.