New Oil-Based Gels to Help People with Difficulty in Swallowing Pills Developed

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Brigham and Women’s Hospital developed a gel made of plant-based oils like sesame oil, which can be mixed with medicine, to make it easier to swallow, according to a recent update in Science Advances. The gels are stable without refrigeration and can be prepared as a variety of textures, such as a thickened beverage, yogurt, or pudding. “This platform will change our capacity for what we can do for kids, and also for adults who have difficulty receiving medication,” Giovanni Traverso, the senior study author who also teaches mechanical engineering at MIT and works as a gastroenterologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, said in a statement. 

The gels were tested with three water-insoluble drugs drawn from the World Health Organization’s list of essential medicines for children: praziquantel, used to treat parasitic infections; lumefantrine, used to treat malaria; and azithromycin, used to treat bacterial infection.  The researchers have obtained US Food and Drug Administration approval to run phase 1 clinical trial of the oleogel formulation of azithromycin, to be done at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in the coming months.  

In a previous study, the research team showed that they could use gels, called ‘oleogels,’ to deliver several types of medications to treat infectious diseases in animal.  To develop the gels, the research team tested several types of plant-derived oils, such as sesame oil, cottonseed oil, and flaxseed oil, mixed with edible gelling agents such as beeswax and rice bran wax.  In animal tests, the team found that oleogels were able to deliver doses equal to or higher than the amounts that could be absorbed from tablets.