The Bundesinstitut für Arzneimittel und Medizinprodukte (BfArM), the German drug regulation authority, issued guidelines for determining whether bioavailability/bioequivalence studies are required for certain drugs. This decision tree is based on pharmacodynamic, pharmacokinetic, and physicochemical criteria. Details of this decision tree were worked out by an expert panel, the Bioavailability Commission at the BfArM. The decision tree has been in use by German regulatory authorities for more than 10 years. In the meantime, its essentials were adopted by the European Committee for Proprietary Medicinal Products (CPMP) and by the World Health Organization (WHO) for their "Guidelines on interchangeability of multisource pharmaceutical products." This article reviews the original decision tree of the BfArM and provides examples of drugs that have been assessed according to its rules. The current procedure of the German regulatory authorities for judging the necessity of bioavailability trials, which reflects the status quo of regulatory practice in Germany, is also discussed.
The configurational stability of (+)-and (−)-diethylpropion [(+)-and (−)-2-(diethyl)-1-phenyl-1-propanone or (+)-and (−)-DEP] was investigated systematically from chemical, pharmaceutical, and pharmacological aspects. The enantiomeric ratio was monitored directly with a recently developed stability-indicating enantioselective HPLC method.In aqueous solutions, the rate of racemization increased non-linearly with increasing pH and with increasing phosphate buffer concentration. The racemization rate showed a positive slope with increasing temperature and decreasing ionic strength.The racemization rates of (+)-and (−)-DEP in the presence of cyclodextrins (CDs) did not differ significantly. CDs that were added to (+)-and (−)-DEP in a molar ratio 5:1 showed the following effects after dissolution in 10 mM phosphate buffer (final pH 6.7): sulfobutyl ether--CD (SBE--CD) and methylated--CD (Me--CD) retarded racemization; whereas hydroxypropyl--CD (HP--CD), acetyl-␥-CD (Ac-␥-CD), acetyl--CD (Ac--CD), ␥-CD, and -CD showed a weak destabilising effect. In contrast to the described CDs, ␣-CD distinctly accelerated the rate of racemization.The configurational stability of (+)-and (−)-DEP was also studied under physiological conditions. The half-life of racemization in heparinised human plasma was for both enantiomers determined to be approximately 23-25 min.In phosphate buffer (10 mM, pH 7.4), rac-DEP showed a high, but unselective affinity towards human ␣ 1 -acid glycoprotein (orosomucoid) immobilised on silica (Chiral AGP).The rate of racemization of the free base of (−)-DEP dissolved in organic solutions generally increases with the polarity of the solvating agent.
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