CPhI 2015 – Gerresheimer focuses on usability

Gerresheimer will be exhibiting a range of usability engineered standard and specialty packaging products in glass and plastic at CPhI in Madrid. Visitors can talk to Gerresheimer’s international experts at CPhI booth 4F30.

Usability - The objective is maximum technical reliability

“More and more people are self-medicating,” said Jessica Kreher, a graduate designer specializing in usability and Sales Engineer at Gerresheimer Medical Systems. She added that the demographic changes taking place in many countries around the world have contrib-uted to the self-medication trend, as has the rapid increase in access to medical care in developing nations.

Jessica Kreher will be illuminating the advantages of usability in a pres-entation for CPhI visitors entitled “Usability Engineering for Drug Delivery Devices “at 2 p.m. on October 13. 

International design control regulations apply to usability engineering programs for medical and pharmaceutical products. The risk management standard, ISO 14971, sets out the application of risk management to medical devices in order to mitigate the technical and operational risks as far as possible. The objective is to maximize user safety, for example, by ensuring that an inhaler administers the entire required dose of an asthma drug.

Usability affects both patients and health professionals such as doctors and nurses. Gerresheimer Medical Systems’ product portfolio extends from easy-open tablet bottles and an application aid that helps eye drop users to position the bottle properly to syringes, injection pens, asthma inhalers and an optimized heart catheter delivery device.

Glass syringe study

Good usability is also important in glass syringes. The Gerresheimer Center of Excellence for ready-to-fill glass syringes in Bünde examined 20,000 syringes in different sizes and configurations, and for various applications, between 2011 and 2015. The large-scale study identified the factors that are decisive to optimum syringe function. All kinds of pharmaceutical drugs are administered in pre-filled syringes. They simplify the entire injection process because they already contain the correct quantity of the drug and are ready to use immediately. Prefilled syringes speed up hospital and clinic processes. They also allow people without medical training to perform the injection or the patients to inject themselves.  Auto-injectors, which contain a pre-filled syringe, are increasingly being used by patients in their homes. For example, they permit arthritis sufferers to inject their medication without another person’s assistance.

DUMA Twist-Off Advanced containers

One of Gerresheimer’s longstanding best-selling branded products, the Duma Twist-Off plastic container, is designed for usability and functionality. One of the improvements which have been made is the introduction of a rounded base to eliminate thin areas. This new design achieves an even more uniform wall thickness all over the container, offering improved barrier properties compared to a more organic design. Container volume, average wall thickness and the main dimensions are key specifications for registrations and stability tests, so they have not been changed. The new containers are compatible with high-performance Duma Twist-Off closures and the existing Duma Twist-Off range because they have the same filling line settings.

New DUMA Twist-Off closure – senior-friendly, child-resistant and tamper-evident features in one single closure

These features reflect the constant focus on child safety and serious accident prevention, as well as the growing senior population, greater demand for packaging solutions designed for people with disabilities and the trend of self-medication. The improved Duma Twist-Off Closure 03833D has a new design that meets these conflicting needs. A pictogram on the closure explains the special opening mechanism that prevents children from being able to open it (child-resistant feature), and a castellated design with “turrets” provides a better grip and can be opened very easily with a pen or another suitable implement (senior-friendly feature).