Grant: Applied Research and Development Grants - Level 1

Recent studies have highlighted the value of COX2 inhibitors as alternatives to opioids for the management of postoperative pain and, in particular, the use of Celecoxib. Due to its very low water solubility Celebrex is only available in tablet, precluding its use during and immediately after surgery when tablet formulations cannot be administered. Altus Formulation is a pharmaceutical company specialized in the development of innovative drug delivery systems. Among their various delivery platforms, the SmartCelle technology enables the parenteral delivery of highly insoluble drugs. Previous animal studies have highlighted the potential of the technology as results demonstrated the versatility and the tolerability of the approach. This project aims to develop and validate a postoperative pain model to evaluate the potency of novel analgesic formulations and to assess the potency of an injectable formulation of Celecoxib in the animal model. TransBIOTech will first evaluate the response to currently use injectable analgesics, buprenorphin and Ketorolac of the plantar incision pain model in the rat by measuring the sensitivity of the animals to mechanical stimulation. Afterward, the potency of the novel injectable formulation of Celecoxib will be evaluated in the plantar incision model and compared to Ketorolac.*