Formulation Development and Invitro Evaluation of Cefixime Trihydrate Loaded Chitosan – Alginate Transdermal Patches

Cefixime trihydrate is a third generation cephalosporin with a broad spectrum bactericidal activity. Due to its short biological half-life, it is required for frequent dosing. So, transdermal delivery system was chosen to deliver the drug directly to the systemic circulation thereby to reduce the dose as well as the frequency of dosing. Transdermal matrix patches of Cefixime trihydrate were prepared by Solvent casting method using Chitosan and Sodium alginate as polymers Two types of Chitosan with mol.wt.190kDa and 419kDa were used. The patches prepared were found to be having good physicochemical properties. After 24 hours of in-vitro dissolution studies, the drug release was found to be maximum (89%) from the formulation FS-1. The release patterns of the patches were controlled and were found for extended period of time. The kinetic profiles show that the drug release followed zero-order kinetics and fits with Higuchi’s model. The rate of drug permeation after 24hrs through rat skin was found to be 68.27% from the formulation FS-1. The drug permeation profile suggests that it followed Fick’s law of diffusion. The values of the correlation coefficient were found to be linear for the Zero order release. The permeation rate was further enhanced to 87.25% with formulation FPE, by using permeation enhancer like Span-80 (1%). The permeation co-efficient of the formulations FS-1 and FPE were 17.83mg/cm2/day and 21.32mg/cm2/day respectively. The enhancement ratio was found to be 1.19. The On the basis of the above studies, it could be concluded that the polymer Chitosan of low molecular weight and high molecular weight, cross linked with a co-polymer like Sodium alginate could be utilized for the transdermal drug delivery of anti-bacterial drugs like Cefixime trihydrate.