Abstract
In this work, polymer blends based on poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) and different ratios (5 and 10 wt%) of methylcellulose (MC) were prepared into films by solution casting using water as a common solvent, and gamma irradiated at different doses. The blends before and after gamma irradiation were loaded with Doxycycline hyclate (DOX-h) as drug model. The effect of DOX-h drug on the chemical and physical properties was first investigated in terms of gel content, swelling and surface morphology by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The gamma irradiated PVA/MC blends was evaluated for the possible use in drug delivery systems. In this respect, the release profiles of DOX-h from PVA/MC were investigated. It was found that the accumulated drug release from the blends increases with time to reach ~60% after 1 h at pH of 2 compared to ~100% at pH of 8.