Development of a New Age-Appropriate, Chewable Tablet of Mebendazole 500 mg for Preventive Chemotherapy of Soil-Transmitted Helminth Infections in Pre-School and School-Age Children

The aim of this study was to develop an age-appropriate tablet of mebendazole 500 mg to be used in large donation programs by the World Health Organization (WHO) for preventive chemotherapy of soil-transmitted helminth (STH) infections in pre-school and school-age children living in tropical and subtropical endemic areas. To that end, a new oral tablet formulation was developed that can be either chewed or given to young (≥1 year old) children by spoon after rapid disintegration to a soft mass with the addition of a small amount of water directly on the spoon.

Although the tablet was manufactured using conventional fluid bed granulation, screening, blending, and compression processes, one of the main challenges was to combine properties of a chewable, dispersible, and regular (solid) immediate release tablet to meet the predefined requirements. The tablet disintegration time was below 120 s, allowing for administration by the “spoon method”. The tablet hardness was higher (160-220 N) than normally applicable for chewable tablets, permitting shipment along a lengthy supply chain in a primary 200-tablet count bottle packaging. In addition, the resulting tablets are stable for 48 months in all climatic zones (I–IV). In this article, several aspects of the development of this unique tablet are described, including formulation, process development, stability, clinical acceptability testing, and regulatory filing.

Figure 4. Illustration of the new mebendazole chewable tablet 500 mg turning into a soft mass with (A) placing the tablet on a spoon, (B) adding approx. 2 mL of purified/potable water (drop-wise), (C) waiting for 120 s during dispersion, and (D) spreading the soft mass on a solid surface to check for the absence of lumps or hard mass.

Materials used in formulation development beside others:

Povidone (Ashland, Texas City, USA), microcrystalline cellulose (MCC) low moisture grade with nominal particle size of 100 µm (FMC, Cork, Ireland), crospovidone (BASF, Ludwigshafen, Germany), sucralose (Tate & Lyle, McIntosh Alabama, USA), strawberry flavor (Symrise, Holzminden, Germany), magnesium stearate (Peter Greven, Venlo, The Netherlands) and purified water were purchased commercially.

Download the full study as PDF here: Development of a New Age-Appropriate, Chewable Tablet of Mebendazole 500 mg for Preventive Chemotherapy of Soil-Transmitted Helminth Infections in Pre-School and School-Age Children

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Ben Van Hove, Pritam Kanagale, Thomas Quinten, Sheetal Gaiki, Karin Collignon, Yogesh Swar, Jimit Shah, Ellen Verheyen, Florentina-Maria Preda, Asim Samanta, Ernesto Fernandez, Giuseppe Caporicci, Teresa Ferreira, Wouter Lequieu, Johan Masschelein, Daniel Schaufelberger, Development of a New Age-Appropriate, Chewable Tablet of Mebendazole 500 mg for Preventive Chemotherapy of Soil-Transmitted Helminth Infections in Pre-School and School-Age Children, European Journal of Pharmaceutics and Biopharmaceutics, 2023, , ISSN 0939-6411,
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejpb.2023.05.013.

excipients formulation