Three-month, zero-order piroxicam release from monodispersed double-walled microspheres of controlled shell thickness

Double-walled microspheres represent an increasingly important class of drug delivery devices that provide enhanced control of drug delivery schedules. Clearly, the overall particle size and shell thickness are important parameters in modulating the drug release rates. Precision particle fabrication technology has been used to fabricate double-walled microspheres of predefined uniform diameters of 40-60 μm exhibiting a poly(D,L-lactide-co-glycolide) (PLG) core and poly(L-lactide) (PL) shell of controllable thickness from ∼2 to 10 μm. The release of a model small-molecule drug, piroxicam, from uniform microspheres of pure PLG and PL is compared to the release from double-walled microspheres exhibiting different PL shell thicknesses. The presence of the PL shell enveloping a PLG core essentially eliminated the initial "burst" of piroxicam that was observed when the drug was released from pure PLG microspheres. In addition, increasing the PL shell thickness shifted the release profile from a biphasic shape for pure PLG microspheres to zero-order piroxicam release over 3 months for the thickest (∼10 μm) PL shell.