Transdermal Drug Delivery Systems

The human skin is a readily accessible surface for drug delivery. Skin of an average adult body covers a surface of approximately 2 m2 and receives about one-third of the blood circulating through the body.

Over the past decades, developing controlled drug delivery has become increasingly important in the pharmaceutical industry. There is considerable interest in the skin as a site of drug application both for local and systemic effect. However, the skin, in particular the stratum corneum, poses a formidable barrier to drug penetration thereby limiting topical and transdermal bioavailability. Skin penetration enhancement techniques have been developed to improve bioavailability and increase the range of drugs for which topical and transdermal delivery is a viable option. During the past decade, the number of drugs formulated into patches has hardly increased, and there has been little change in the composition of the patch systems. Moreover, there were only limited innovations in topical formulations and medical devices aimed at enhancing transdermal drug penetration.

The purpose of this presentation is to review the transdermal delivery market and elaborate on one unique delivery platform that accelerates epidermal delivery and improves efficacy of pharmaceutical products. The technology is a natural, marine extracted microinjection that creates micro channels for effective dermal delivery of active compounds.

NGT is constantly seeking novel technologies developing alternate route of drug administration.