Hot Melt Extrusion Technique

Various approaches have been adopted to address this including preparation of solid dispersions and solid solutions. Hot-melt extrusion is an efficient technology for producing solid molecular dispersions with considerable advantages over solvent-based processes such as spray drying and co-precipitation. Hot-melt extrusion has been demonstrated to provide sustained, modified, and targeted drug delivery. Hot-melt extrusion (HME) is an established process that has been used since the early 1930s, predominately in the plastics manufacturing industry, but also in the food processing industry. Currently, more than half of all plastic products, including bags, sheets, and pipes, are manufactured using HME. Since the advent of plastics production, polymers have been melted and formed to different shapes for a variety of industrial and domestic applications. HME is the process of embedding drug in a polymeric carrier. Specifically, HME dosage forms are complex mixtures of API, functional excipients, and processing aids which are blended using industry-standard equipment. The mixture is processed at elevated temperature and pressure, which disperses the drug in the matrix at a molecular level through the formation of a solid solution. Extruded material can be further processed into a variety of dosage forms, including capsules, tablets and transmucosal systems. Today this technology has found its place in the array of pharmaceutical manufacturing operations. Melt extrusion process are currently applied in the pharmaceutical field for the manufacture of a variety of dosage forms and formulations such as granules, pellets, tablets, suppositories, implants, stents, transdermal systems and ophthalmic inserts. This is relevant for poorly-soluble pharmaceutically active substances, frequently encountered among novel drugs. Introduction, Method , Discussion