Stability analysis for drugs with multiple active ingredients.

For every drug product on the market, the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requires that an expiration dating period (shelf-life) must be indicated on the immediate container label. For determination of the expiration dating period of a drug product, regulatory requirements and statistical methodology are provided in the FDA and ICH Guidelines. However, this guideline is developed for drug products with a single active ingredient. There are many drug products consisting of multiple active ingredients, especially for most traditional Chinese medicine. In this article, we propose a statistical method for determining the shelf-life of a drug product with multiple active ingredients following similar idea as suggested by the FDA and assuming that these active ingredients are linear combinations of some factors. Stability data observed from a traditional Chinese medicine were analysed to illustrate the proposed method.

Duke Scholars

Author Shein-Chung Chow Biostatistics & Bioinformatics, Division of Biostatistics