Enhancing the Effectiveness of Paracetamol Tablets with Chitosan Nanoparticle

Abstract

Recently chitosan nanoparticles have received great interest for pharmacological toxicity and nanomedicine as a drug release system with improved bioavailability. This study aimed to prepare chitosan nanoparticles and explore the application of chitosan nanoparticles in pharmaceutical formulations, specifically in improving the formulation of paracetamol tablets for medical application. Chemical method was used for the preparation of the nanoparticles, Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy (FE-SEM), Atomic Force Microscope (AFM), X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) and Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) techniques used to evaluate the morphology, topography and chemical structure of the precipitated nanoparticles. The revealed Nano-sphere like structures with dimeters of 41 to 74 nm. Chitosan nanoparticles have good binding, disintegrating and biodegradable properties, therefore it was used to improve the prepared paracetamol tablets. In this study, the tablets were prepared using a conventional wet granulation process.  The results showed a good flowability property and an excellent compressibility profile compered to PVP K30. The physical properties of the prepared tablets were evaluated and the results showed an improvement in hardness and friability tests in prepared tablets compared to commercial tablets. The in-vitro drug release profiles for prepared and commercial tablets were evaluated in three distinct dissolution media (pH 0.1 HCl, pH 4.5 acetate buffer and pH 5.8 phosphate buffer). The results demonstrated nearly complete release of the prepared drug, with 100% released at approximately 20, 18, and 16 minutes, respectively. Based on the results, we can conclude that the chemical method was successful in preparing chitosan nanoparticles. In addition to that, it may be concluded that it is possible to improve the commercial paracetamol tablets using chitosan nanoparticles as a binder instead to PVP K30. Paracetamol tablets that contains chitosan nanoparticles have been successfully proved in enhancing of physical and chemical properties.