Tablet shapes to enhance gastric retention of swellable controlled-release oral dosage forms
AssigneeDepomed, Inc.
InventorsBret Berner, Jenny Louie-Helm
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The retention of oral drug dosage forms in the stomach is improved by using swellable dosage forms that are shaped in a manner that will prevent them from inadvertently passing through the pylorus as a result of being in a particular orientation. The planar projection of the shape is one that has two orthogonal axes of different lengths, the longer being short enough to permit easy swallowing prior to swelling while the shorter is long enough within one-half hour of swelling to prevent passage through the pylorus.
Claims27
A controlled-release oral drug dosage form for releasing a drug into at least a portion of a region defined by the stomach and the upper gastrointestinal tract, said dosage form comprising a solid monolithic matrix with said drug contained therein, said matrix being non-circular in shape and having first and second orthogonal axes of unequal length, said matrix being one that swells in an unrestricted manner along both such axes upon imbibition of water, the longer such axis having a maximum length of 3.0 cm when said matrix is unswollen, and the shorter such axis achieving a minimum length of 1.2 cm within one hour of immersion of said dosage form in water and wherein said matrix has a shape which when projected onto a plane, is either an oval or a parallelogram.
A controlled-release oral drug dosage form in accordance with claim in which said longer axis has a maximum length of 2.5 cm when said matrix is unswollen.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.