Abstract

The primary objective of this work is to enhance the bioavailability of ferrous sulphate, which has low oral bioavailability and hence is subjected to frequent drug administration which results side effects. In this study, ferrous sulphate was microencapsulated with carbopol, a mucoadhesive polymer to form carbopol encapsulated ferrous sulphate microspheres and evaluated their surface morphology, mucoadhesiveness, in vitro drug release, swelling characteristics, in vitro cell cytotoxicity, acute systemic dose and oral bioavailability. Carbopol-encapsulated ferrous sulphate microspheres have good encapsulation efficiency, good mucoadhesive properties and superior swelling characteristics and offered a sustained drug release over 24 h of drug administration compared to pure ferrous sulphate. The median lethal dose of the developed formulation was estimated from the in vivo acute oral toxicity studies. It was also found from the bioavailability studies that microencapsulation of ferrous sulphate with carbopol improves systemic oral bioavailability of ferrous sulphate and can be of great potential as a mucoadhesive drug delivery system in the oral therapy of iron deficiency anaemia.