RESEARCH AND REVIEWS: JOURNAL OF DENTAL SCIENCES Medicated Chewing Gum: An Overview

Oral drug delivery system has been area of interest for researcher and scientist to explore it to the extreme potential in drug delivery system in past few years. The researchers are focusing on this drug delivery because of ease of administration and comfort offered by this route to patient. Hence drug delivery can be achieved by incorporating medicament in Chewing gum (CG) base because oral mucosa is highly vascular in nature resulting in rapid absorption of the drug into the systemic circulation. Chewing gum is a combination of a water-immiscible phase, known as gum base (insoluble gum base resin), emulsifiers, elastomers, fillers, antioxidants, softeners, sweeteners, food colourings, flavouring agents, waxes and in case of medicated chewing gum there is an incorporation of active substances in the formulation for getting the desired therapeutic effect. Due to sweet and refreshing taste of chewing gum it can be used as drug delivery system (DDS). CG can be used in prevention of dental caries, prevent the dryness of mouth and help in maintaining oral hygiene. Therefore it can be concluded that oral drug delivery can make treatment more patient friendly, can be taken without water and reduce the cost of manufacturing compared to convention DDS.