In vitro - In vivo correlation in the development of oral drug formulation: A screenshot of the last two decades.

In vitro - in vivo correlation (IVIVC) allows prediction of the in vivo performance of a pharmaceutical product based on its in vitro drug release profiles and can be used to optimize formulations, set dissolution limits, reduce the number of bioequivalence studies during product development, and facilitate certain regulatory decisions. This review article aimed to assess papers published in the last two decades regarding the use of the IVIVC in the development of oral formulations, to demonstrate the scenario in this area, as well as to describe the main characteristics of the assessed studies. A systematic search of PubMed and Web of Science databases was conducted to retrieve articles reporting the use of the IVIVC in the oral formulation development in the period from 1998 to 2018. The qualified studies were abstracted regarding drug name, dosage form, BCS class, in vitro and in vivo data, level of IVIVC, number of formulations, presence of the validation and predictability. The discussion was supported by these data, which allowed to address broadly strengths and weaknesses in this area. Moreover, a large database has been described in this article containing different IVIVC models, with different substances, providing support to scientists interested in this area.