Development of Automated Diffusion Cell for Determining In Vitro Drug Release from Transdermal Device

경피흡수제형의 in vitro 약물방출실험을 위한 연속확산 장치의 개발

An automated, simple, and reliable method was developed for determining in vitro drug release rate from transdermal delivery dosage forms. The patch is held in position in the heating block by sandwiching it between the middle plate and the bottom plate of diffusion cell. The dissolution profile of the commercially available transdermal scopolamine patch was determined over a 72-h period, and the results were compared with those obtained with other methods; paddle-over-disk method, reciprocating method, and diffusion cell method. It was demonstrated that the flow-through method is equivalent in terms of release rate profile and accumulated released drug amount over the lifetime of the dosage form tested. Also this method is simple, reliable and reproducible. Therefore, this technique can be used in a quality control for assuring product uniformity.