Pharmaceutics Midterm Flashcards
(100 cards)
What can go wrong?
- Drug Recalls
- Impurity
- Labeling error - Drug Shortages
- Ex. Doxil
Drug Recalls: Impurity
- Mitoxantrone injection USP because “product may not support the specification results for known impurity prior to expiry”
- Piperacillin and Tazobactram for injection because “potential presence of particulate matter”
Drug Recalls: Labeling Error
- SteriMax-Vancomycin Hal Injection USP because “a typographical error was identified on one lot. Although unlikely, there is a potential for a dosing error to occur if the reconstitution information on the secondary cares of the French text is used” (not actually a recall, just a letter of notice)
- Atropine sulfate injection because “inaccurate dosing information on inner and outer labels”
Glaxo Whistle Blower Lawsuit
- 2002
- CHERYL ECKARD was assigned to lead a quality assurance team toe ablate a GSK plant in Cidra, Puerto Rico
- Found that “all systems were broken, the facility was broken, the equipment was broken, the processes were broken.” It was the worst thing she had ever seen.
- GSK pleaded guilty to a felony and admitted to distributing adulterated drugs (Paxil CR, Avandamet, Kytril and Bactroban)
- GSK paid $750 million in settlement
Drug Shortages
- Primary cause: Quality problems at the manufacturing facility
- Increasing in frequency and severity due to fewer companies making drugs
- 80% of drug shortages reported in 2010-2011 were sterile injectable products, with 28% of those being for oncology drugs
Drug Shortages: Common Manufacturing Issues
- Sterility of product
- Presence of foreign matter and impurities
- Crystallization of active ingredient
- Formation of precipitate
- Breakdown of equiment
Drug Shortages: Doxil
- Doxil is an anti-cancer medication
- 2011: FDA found major issues in the third party manufacturer’s facility and shut it down, leading to a shortage of Doxil for a year
- This drug is so important that there was even a push to approve a drug from Korea for the time being
- FDA ended up letting Jannsen rehab a small part of the facility in order to help deal with the shortage
Drug Shortages: Dynamics of Sterile Injectable Drug Shortages
Supply Distribution –> Drug Shortage
-Contributing Factors
+Manufacturing Issues: few producers, specialized facilities and dedicated lines
+Supply Chain Issues: Just-in-time inventory (prevents surplus and reduces expenses)
Drug Manufacturing and Pharmaceutical Analysis
- Arrival of starting and packaging material
- Sampling of starting materials
- Manufacturing
- Filling
- Labeling
- Packaging
- Documentation and control of finished product and product release
Pharmaceutical Analysis occurs at steps 1, 3 and 7
- Raw materials arrive and are stored in a separate area; samples are taken for analysis to ensure identity and purity of the material
- Following manufacture of the drug product, it is held in quarantine and samples are analyzed prior to filling in the designated containers
- Following release of finished product, samples are retained for evaluation
Roles of Pharmaceutical Analysis
- Assurance of raw material and drug product quality and stability
- Evaluation of the PK of a drug
- Therapeutic drug monitoring
- Clinical and forensic toxicology analysis
- Analysis of blood and urine samples for professional athletes
Pharmaceutical Analysis Terms: Identity Test
Identification of a drug or substance that does not involve quantitation
Pharmaceutical Analysis Terms: Assay
A quantitative analysis of a drug or substance
Pharmaceutical Analysis Terms: Analyte
The drug or substance being analyzed
Pharmaceutical Analysis Terms: Standard
A solution of a drug or substance of known concentration
Pharmaceutical Analysis Terms: Calibration Curve
A plot of the analytical signal versus concentration for a series of standards
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: UV-Vis Spectrum
UV: 200-380 nm
Visible: 380-750 nm
IR: >750 nm
Most drugs absorb in UV region, but some are colored and absorb in visible region
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: Absorbance of Radiation
- Atoms are held together by covalent bonds formed by electron sharing
- Electronic ground state: Energy of their electrons are at a minimum
- Radiation is absorbed through excitation of electrons involved in the bonds between atoms
- Electrons in weaker bonds can be excited by radiation in >200 nm range (lower wavelengths)
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: Chromophores and their Absorbance Maxima
- Carbonyl, ketone –> 271 nm
- Carbonyl, aldehyde –> 293 nm
- Carboxyl –> 204
- Amide –> 208
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: Qualitative Analysis
- Useful for identifying the drug based on wavelength max values
- Not an absolute identification technique because many drugs with similar structures have similar values
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: Quantitative Analysis
- Compares absorbance to a standard of the drug of known concentrations
- Can also calibrate curve obtained by analysis of several standards
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: Absorption Measurements
- Typically operate 200-800 nm
- Light passes through cuvette and amount of absorbed light is measured
- Cuvettes are Quartz or UV transparent
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: Beer-Lambert Law
Absorbance = a x b x c
a: molar absorptivity or extinction coefficient
b: path length
c: concentration
A = log (I0,I)
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: Drug Quantitation
-Using the Beer-Lambert Lab, a and b are constants, so we can solve for concentration
C(unknown) = A(unknown) x C(standard) / A(standard)
UV-Vis Spectroscopy in Drug Analysis: Example - Furosemide Standard Curve Method
Asked to determine if a lot of furosemide tablets contain the indicated amount of active pharmaceutical ingredient per tablet
- Assay a concentration in the middle of the calibration curve (about 0.025 mg/mL)
- Dilute 400 mg in 250 mL and then dilute 5 mL of that to 250 mL to get desired concentration (0.032 mg/mL)
- Measure absorption (A = 0.80)
- Using calibration curve equation (A = 26.67*C), C = 0.030 mg/mL
- Obtain % of expected concentration
0.030/0.032 = 93.8%