BIOMEDICAL EVALUATION OF POLYMERIC HYDROGEL DERMAL PATCHES AS WOUND DRESSING

摘要

Polysaccharide polymeric systems have been used to develop dermal patches for wound dressing. The polymeric dermal patch systems have shown advantages achieving sustained release, good bioadhesion and higher therapeutic efficacy. Gatifloxacin is a fluoroquinolone antimicrobial agent useful in the treatment of wound infections. An attempt has been made to formulate dermal patches of Gatifloxacin using chitosan blended with hydroxypropyl methyl cellulose (HPMC) and hydroxypropyl cellulose (HPC) as polymers by casting and solvent evaporation technique. Glycerol (1 % w/v) was added to improve the flexibility of dermal patches, glutaraldehyde (1 % w/v) was incorporated as a cross linking agent. The prepared dermal patches were then evaluated for biomedical parameters such as contact angle of distilled water, bioadhesion strength, heamocompatibility, oxygen penetration test, in vitro degradation, microbial penetration studies and wet integration test. The results showed that the polymeric hydrogel dermal patches could meet the essential requirements for a reasonable wound dressing with desirable characteristics. The results also indicated that the effect of the chitosan blended with HPMC polymeric hydrogel fulfilled the requirements to obtain the dermal patch with optimal properties for wound management.