Chrono pharmacotherapy: A pulsatile Drug Delivery

Chronopharmacotherapy refers to a treatment in which controlled drug delivery is achieved according to circadian rhythms of disease by enhancing therapeutic outcomes and minimizing side effects. Colon targeting has gained great importance not only for the treatment of local diseases such as Crohn's disease, inflammatory bowel disease and ulcerative colitis but also very important in systemic delivery of proteins/peptides, anti-asthmatic drugs, anti-diabetic agents and anti hypertensive drugs, which mostly show their efficacy based on circadian rhythms of the body.Colon drug delivery is one of the difficult approaches to achieve the targeted and desired outcomes through pulsatile drug delivery by avoiding dose dumping. The main reason behind the use of pulsatile delivery is provision of constant drug release where a zero-order release is not preferred. Chronopharmacotherapy in colon targeting play its role by many systems such as capsular systems, pulsatile system and osmotic systems, which are based on use of rupturable membranes and biodegradable polymers. The objective of this review article is to provide latest knowledge about drugs with chrono-pharmacological behavior specially to the colon.