Effect of Concentration of Gellan Gum and Calcium Chloride Solution on Entrapment Efficiency and Drug Release from Calcium Gellan Beads.

Gellan gum has wide variety of applications, mainly concentrated in ophthalmic drug delivery and oral sustained release preparations. Due to the characteristic property of cation induced gelation, it has been widely used in the formulation at in situ gelling ophthalmic preparations. The objective of this study was to evaluate concentration dependant effect of gellan gum and calcium chloride solution on entrapment efficiency and drug release of diclofenac sodium through calcium-gellan beads by ionotropic gelation. Prepared beads were evaluated for percentage yield, percentage entrapment efficiency and drug release. It was found that as concentration of gellan gum increases entrapment efficiency increases and as concentration of calcium chloride increases entrapment efficiency decreases. Also as concentration of gellan gum increases drug release decreases and as concentration of calcium increases drug release increases.