Isolation of polysaccharides from Plantago ovata and their evaluation as potential matrices for designing the controlled release floats of Piroxicam

The present study deals with isolation of different polysaccharides from Plantago Ovata husk and their use in designing the controlled release Gastro-Retentive (GR) floats of piroxicam (PRC). Gastroretentive floats are actually drug release (DR) moieties of low density used to retain the drug in stomach for maximum time to increase its bioavailability. The polysaccharides extracted from P. Ovata were selected due to its therapeutic impacts and ease in accessibility although synthetic polymers have already been utilized for designing such types of floats. The floats of that fraction were selected for designing further formulations having least lag time with maximum drug release retarding ability. For modifying the drug release (DR) rate; flax seed gel, gum tragacanth and Stearic acid were used as variables. The direct compression technique was used for compression and floats were characterized for uniformity in weight, drug content, friability and in vitro buoyancy. All fractions were characterized by FTIR, TGA, GPC and SEM study to find the nature of polysaccharide, predicting its stability and compatibility with human body. Some mathematical tools i.e. kinetic study and regression analysis (RA) were applied to find the effect of different variables on DR rate and closeness among the theoretical and experimental DR profile. The ethanol separated part (ENa) was seen to be most suitable in view of its better swelling ability and minimum lag time. The formulation S4F9 was seem to be best fitted due to its minimum lag time, best drug entrapping ability and best suitability to Higuchi's model (R = 0.957) and Power law (R = 0.963). The DR mechanism was found to be nonFickian diffusion (n > 0.45).