Research progress of taste masking and evaluation technology of medicine

Most drugs taste bitter and irritating, resulting in poor compliance of patients, and the bad odor affects the therapeutic effect. The successful research and development of a drug should not only conform to the five quality characteristics of effectiveness, stability, safety, uniformity and economy, but also the compliance of patients to drugs with bad odor. The development of taste masking techniques is critical for bitter drugs.This review describes the principles, advantages and drawbacks of traditional taste masking techniques, and introduces the mechanism and application of novel taste masking techniques, such as melt granulation, hot melt extrusion, 3D printing, drug complex preparation, and bitter taste inhibitors. The in vitro evaluation methods of drug taste masking effect, such as functional magnetic resonance imaging, in vitro dissolution, and electronic tongue technology, are described. And introduce in vivo evaluation methods, such as animal and human taste, in the field of taste masking effect. A new strategy of BP neural network prediction model for drug taste evaluation is proposed, with a view to providing theoretical reference for the future research on drug taste masking.