Studies on mucoadhesiveness of edible plants’ extracted mucoadhesive polymers for designing, development and in-vivo evaluation of gastro-retentive tablets

Natural edible herbal polymers having sufficient mucoadhesive action have been utilized as binding and coating material to develop oral mucoadhesive tablets as controlled release drug delivery systems. The study is highlighting the edible polymers extracted from vegetables and medicinally used leaves in the treatment of jaundice in rural area and their utilization in formulation development for better health care and minimization of health hazards through proper screening and evaluation in comparison to synthetic polymers. Screening and evaluation of edible polymers have been performed by different laboratory adopted techniques such as hydration capacity determining technique, mucoadhesive strength determining techniques - Wilhelmy plate method, Falling ball method, Robinson’s methods and in-vivo rabbit model method. The effective edible herbal polymer having maximum mucoadhesive strength has been selected for devising of oral mucoadhesive tablets for enhanced retention period in gastrointestinal absorption site to improve the bioavailability and efficacy of drugs. Gastro-retentive tablets based on edible herbal polymers can be retained in GIT on hydration and hence can be used for drug targeting to a particular region of GIT for extended periods of time for better efficacy in health care systems.