Mucoadhesive vaginal drug delivery systems.

Vaginal delivery is an important route of drug administration for both local and systemic diseases. The vaginal route has some advantages due to its large surface area, rich blood supply, avoidance of the first-pass effect, relatively high permeability to many drugs and self-insertion. The traditional commercial preparations, such as creams, foams, gels, irrigations and tablets, are known to reside in the vaginal cavity for a relatively short period of time owing to the self-cleaning action of the vaginal tract, and often require multiple daily doses to ensure the desired therapeutic effect. The vaginal route appears to be highly appropriate for bioadhesive drug delivery systems in order to retain drugs for treating largely local conditions, or for use in contraception. In particular, protection against sexually-transmitted diseases is critical. To prolong the residence time in the vaginal cavity, bioadhesive therapeutic systems have been developed in the form of semi-solid and solid dosage forms. The most commonly used mucoadhesive polymers that are capable of forming hydrogels are synthetic polyacrylates, polycarbophil, chitosan, cellulose derivatives (hydroxyethycellulose, hydroxy-propylcellulose and hydroxypropylmethylcellulose), hyaluronic acid derivatives, pectin, tragacanth, carrageenan and sodium alginate. The present article is a comprehensive review of the patents related to mucoadhesive vaginal drug delivery systems.