Sabine Desset-Brethes

Challenges of developing palatable oral paediatric formulations.

Material Sciences and Oral Products Centre of Emphasis, Pfizer Global Research and Development, United Kingdom Institute of Pharmaceutics and Biopharmaceutics, Heinrich-Heine University Düsseldorf, Germany Pharmaceutical and Analytical Development, Novartis Pharma AG, Switzerland Royal Liverpool Children’s NHS Trust, United Kingdom Medicines for Children Research Network, University of Liverpool, United Kingdom The School of Pharmacy, Department of Pharmaceutics, University of London, 29-39 Brunswick Square, London WC1N 1AX, United Kingdom

Application of in vitro biopharmaceutical methods in development of immediate release oral dosage forms intended for paediatric patients.

Biopharmaceutics is routinely used in the design and development of medicines to generate science based evidence to predict in vivo performance; the application of this knowledge specifically to paediatric medicines development is yet to be explored. The aim of this review is to present the current status of available biopharmaceutical tools and tests including solubility, permeability and dissolution that may be appropriate for use in the development of immediate release oral paediatric medicines. The existing tools used in adults are discussed together with any limitations for their use within paediatric populations. The results of this review highlight several knowledge gaps in current methodologies in paediatric biopharmaceutics. The authors provide recommendations based on existing knowledge to adapt tests to better represent paediatric patient populations and also provide suggestions for future research that may lead to better tools to evaluate paediatric medicines.