Intertek publishes study on improving inhalation medicines

Intertek, the leading quality solutions provider to industries worldwide, has published a study on strategies for improving the effectiveness of inhalation medicines.

Dry powder inhalers (DPI) are increasingly popular products for delivering drugs to the lungs due to their ease of use by the patient, environmental sustainability and formulation stability. Historically, these devices have been relatively simple with limited optimisation, but continuing development is generating a variety of device platforms with different characteristics and targets with improved performance. Working with academics from King’s College London and The University of Parma, Italy, the Intertek team explored how the medicine’s formulation and properties of inhalation devices combine to impact performance, and investigated whether clinically effective formulations can be tailored to devices with different properties.

This study, which was published in the International Journal of Pharmaceutics in July 2015, demonstrated how both formulation of the medicine and device factors impact product performance, highlighting that inhaler formulations must be co-optimised with the inhaler device during product development.

'Conducting studies such this is vital to pushing forward the evolution of inhalation technology as a means of delivering drug products and expanding the pharmaceutical industry’s understanding of how to develop more effective medicines,' said Mark Hammond, Pharmaceutical Services Leader, Intertek.

Rob van Dorp CEO of Intertek added: 'Intertek has more than 25 years of experience in analytical testing and formulation for the inhaled products behind treatments for asthma, cystic fibrosis, diabetes, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and has built a reputation for providing outstanding customer service for challenging pharmaceutical development programmes.'

Intertek also provides pharmaceutical development and manufacturing support services spanning analysis, bioanalysis, formulation development, regulatory consultancy, auditing and supply chain management solutions from its network of offices and regulatory laboratories across the globe.