Preface

The solid dosage forms that dissolve or disintegrate quickly in the oral cavity, resulting in solution or suspension, eliminating the need of water for swallowing, are known as fast dissolving/disintegrating dosage forms (FDDFs). Over the last 20 years, the field of FDDFs has expanded considerably to address not only concerns of immediate release dosage forms but additionally played an important role in controlled/modified release drug delivery. This is still an exciting and growing area of pharmaceutical research and education. Ironically, to date no single book provides detailed and specific information on FDDFs. Therefore, I decided to write a book comprising of chapters that collectively address this void and provide an insight into the various technologies and methodologies currently adopted to formulate, prepare and evaluate FDDFs. The idea for this book on the topic has been in mind since my first research project during M.S.(Pharm.) at NIPER, Mohali. Since, then it gradually strengthened when I was Assistant Professor at Seth GL Bihani SD College, Sri Ganganagar and Professor/Associate Professor at Sardar Bhagwan Singh Post Graduate Institute (SBSPGI) of Biomedical Sciences & Research, Dehradun. My teaching and research in relevant and related fields continuously helped me in understanding and developing deeper interests towards FDDFs.

The present book is an attempt to provide comprehensive information to the readers interested in FDDFs. The specific emphasis in this book has been given to various technologies of making FDDFs, formulation development, evaluation, clinical studies, and marketed FDDFs products. This book intends to serve as a source of reference work and some chapters may be used for classroom teaching in graduate/postgraduate programmes. The authors do feel that graduate/postgraduate programmes in pharmaceutical sciences often neglect to adequately address FDDFs as novel drug delivery systems. Research fellows and experience scientists also feel paucity to find few resources outside the primary literature for FDDFs.

Due to its organization into different chapters, the book can be read at different levels and a reader can start as per the sequence of chapters or may opt to go directly onto the desired chapter. Thus, this book could be useful for graduate, postgraduate and PhD students belonging to the pharmaceutical sciences. Nevertheless, we do hope that this book is also useful to expert as well as new researchers, who may find information and new ideas for novel advancements in the field of FDDFs.

I hope that all those who consult this book find it useful as an easy-to-understand text for FDDFs. Constructive comments/suggestions are also invited from readers for further refinements in this book.