Gastro retentive dosage forms: An excellent carrier system for treatment of peptic ulcer

Peptic ulcer (gastric ulcer and duodenal ulcer) is very common chronic disorder of stomach which is mainly caused by the damage or impairment of stomach lining. Various factors such as pepsin, gastric acid, H. pylori, NSAIDs, prostaglandins, mucous, bicarbonate and blood flow to mucosa play an important role in causing peptic ulcer. In this review article, our main focus is on some important approaches (floating, bioadhesive, high density, swellable and magnetic systems) which are helpful in gastro retention of different dosage forms for treatment of peptic ulcer. Various factors such as composition of meal, nature of meal, gender, age, posture, size, shape, density of the dosage form influence the efficiency of above approaches. Currently, a lot of work is running to improve different types of gastro retentive delivery systems of a wide range of drugs and compensate the effects of above factors. In the future, it is anticipated that they will become of growing significance, finally leading to improved efficiency of various types of pharmacotherapies.