QUALITY CONTROL EVALUATION OF BRANDS OF MEBENDAZOLE 100 mg TABLETS ON THE ILLEGITIMATE PHARMACY OUTLETS

Objective: The objective of the present study is to assess physical properties and the quality control parameters of the marketed brands of Mebendazole 100 mg found in illegitimate pharmacy outlets Methods: Five brands of mebendazole 100 mg were identified and purchased in February 2014. The tablets were evaluated for uniformity of weight, friability, hardness, disintegration and assay of active pharmaceutical ingredient according to established methods. Results: Results obtained indicated that all brands comply with official requirements for uniformity of weight and hardness. One brand failed the friability test with more than 1% of weight loss. The disintegration test revealed that two brands disintegrate in less than 2 min while other brands in more than 1 hour. Titrimetric assay of mebendazole content showed only two brands containing not less than 90% (w/w) of labeled chemical content. Conclusion: Brand MBZ3 showed better characteristics of chewable tablet. Consumers need to pay attention to the manufacturer information and chewable tablets have to be treated as such.