EVALUATION OF DISINTEGRANT AND BINDING PROPERTIES OF STARCH DERIVED FROM DISCOREA DUMETORUM ON CIPROFLOXACIN TABLETS

Ordu J. I.* and Enechukwu C. C.

ABSTRACT

This study aims to extract starch from Dioscorea dumetorium (three- leaved yam) and utilize the yam extract as a pharmaceutical excipient in the formulation of Ciprofloxacin tablets of 250mg strength and to evaluate the binding and disintegrant properties, in comparison with corn starch. Starch extracted from the trifoliate yam was confirmed by the Iodine and Molisch tests while percentage content of the active pharmaceutical ingredient (API) was determined via chemical analysis and Uv spectroscopy. Tablet formulation was carried out in three batches as: batch A (trifoliate yam starch (TYS), batch B (corn starch (CS) and batch C (TYS+CS) and by intra and extra granular addition of starches at a concentration of 3 and 5%w/w respectively for all the batches. The micrometric studies of TYS indicated good flow character and compressibility properties with a bulk density of 0.521, tapped density of 0.610, angle of repose 29.8o, Hausner’s ratio of 1.170 and Carr’s index of 14.590. The pre compression analysis of granules showed excellent granular flow properties. The ranking for tensile strength was TYS>(TYS+CS)>CS, although reversed order for friability while for disintegration and dissolution test, the ranking was in the order TYS>CS>(TYS+CS). In overall, the results obtained suggests that starch from D. dumetorium yam could be a better alternative in tablet formulations where a high bond strength is essential, but combination of corn and TYS at 1:1 ratio presented better result than other batches hence could be more applicable when faster disintegration/dissolution time of tablets is required.

Keywords: D. dumetorum, starch, Evaluation, Disintegrant, Binding, Ciprofloxacin, Tablets.