I did my undergraduate about 10 years ago in this very institution and was eager to come back after sufficiently practicing in this field to specialize in an area that will be beneficial to the community I serve. I am a pharmacist working for the county government, my primary areas are validation of prescriptions, dispensing medications, improving and monitoring use of medicines, extemporaneous preparations, primary health care, pharmacovigilance and being part of various multi-disciplinary teams in the public hospital where I am stationed. I have also worked in public, private and academia before My dissertation for is about formulating and characterizing an oral gel of Nystatin-lidocaine. In formulating this gel I hope this gel will be used by all groups of the general population to whom it will be accessible, improve compliance and quality of life
Project Summary
Formulation and in vitro characterization of Nystatin-Lidocaine oral gel
Due to changes in the practice of medicine such as the introduction of broad-spectrum antibiotics, immunosuppressive agents, transplants, in-dwelling catheters and the rise of morbid conditions such as diabetes, severe malnutrition in children and HIV/AIDS, the incidence of fungal infections especially candidiasis has increased. Candidiasis is a frequent cause of discomfort in the mouth, pain, altered taste and aversion to food.
Currently, drug delivery systems such as bucco-adhesive tablets, mouthwashes, oral suspension and oral gels are used for a various conditions of the oral mucosa. These required repeated dosing to achieve optimum concentration at infection sites. Oral gels are preferred because they provide better drug absorption due to longer residence time and can be modified to give controlled release. By formulating nystatin-lidocaine oral gel that will hopefully be locally adsorbed for a longer period of time, hence have fewer dosing frequency than the oral solution.,while lidocaine numbs the pain on site with local lesions..
Nystatin-lidocaine gels were obtained using a two level, three model factorial experimental design. The concentration of carbopol 940 (at 0.25 and 0.7%), tween 20(at 0.5 and 2%) and glycerol (at 0.5 and 0.8%), were varied while the other excipients were held constant. From the formed gels, a 32 factorial design facilitated optimization of the formulations using the Design Expert® (version 12). The formulated gels were evaluated for quality by conducting analytical testing for drug content, spreadability, pH and viscosity. The analytical parameters tested were found to be fit-for-purpose.
Supervisors
Dr. Shital Maru
Dr.Alex Okaru
