Microemulsions as colloidal vehicle systems for dermal drug delivery. Part IV: Investigation of microemulsion systems based on a eutectic mixture of lidocaine and prilocaine as the colloidal phase by dynamic light scattering.

Stable oil-in-water (o/w) microemulsions used as vehicles for dermal drug delivery have been developed using lidocaine (lignocaine) and prilocaine in oil form (eutectic mixture), a blend of a high (Tween 80, hydrophilic-lipophilic balance (HLB) = 15.0) and a low (Poloxamer 331, HLB = 1.0) HLB surfactant and propylene glycol-water as hydrophilic phase. These microemulsions were able to solubilize up to 20% eutectic mixture of lidocaine and prilocaine without phase separation. The dispersity of the oil phase was investigated by dynamic light scattering. Small colloidal droplets for stable microemulsions of 5~10 nm were observed. At constant surfactant and hydrophilic phase concentration, increasing the total drug concentration in the microemulsion resulted in an increase in the droplet size of the dispersed, colloidal phase. It was observed that a monolayer of surfactant surrounds the oil (eutectic mixture) core. Colloidal droplets of the microemulsion interact via hard sphere with supplementary attractive interaction. This observed interparticle attractive interaction could explain the observed phase behaviour with respect to change in the basicity of the hydrophilic phase as well as the increase in volume fraction of the dispersed, colloidal phase. It was also observed that the stability and size of this dispersed phase depends on the pH of the composition. Because these microemulsions formed stable, isotropic systems in the range of pH 9.5 to 10.4 with alkali buffer or NaOH solution instead of water as hydrophilic phase, so one can produce microemulsions in this pH area.