This is the most extensively used tablet coating technique in the pharmaceutical industry. It personifies the tablet with different dyes and helps to stabilize the chemical compound. The unpleasant smell and taste of the pill are also masked.
The film coating technique includes placing film solutions on tablets through a sprayer. This procedure is done once with a polymer, plasticizer, solvent, and dye solution.
The pills are sprayed and quickly dried in a rotating tablet pan. After drying, a thin coating of polymer is created around a tablet. The tablet can sometimes keep its color; however, this can be adjusted if the solution is mixed with various dyes.
There are now numerous varieties of tablet coating machines on the market. The following are the three main categories.
- Standard Pan
- Perforated Pan
- Fluidized Bed Processor
Film Coating Process
A polymer is dissolved in a solvent as well as other materials such as plasticizers, dyes, and pigments and sprayed into the tablet coater.
You must put the tablets periodically into the coating pan to conduct the film coating. Measure the distance between the spray nozzle and tablet bed precisely and appropriate adjustments for even layering over the bed.
The coating solution may normally atomize to very thin droplets. As the coating pan spins with the tablets, the sprayer will disperse the coating solution on the bed.
Most of these devices include a multi-sprayer system. Droplets of the solvent hit the tablet and form a coating before the vapor is removed by hot air. This happens in a single-stage procedure, which retains a 2-3% rise in pill weight. The tablets are then dried to remove the solvent, resulting in a thin coating on each tablet known as a film.