Croscarmellose sodium

Croscarmellose sodium is an excipient in medical formulations. It is highly absorbent and insoluble (like a sponge). This brings the remaining ingredients into better contact with bodily fluids and improves their bioavailability.

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Chemically, croscarmellose sodium is the sodium salt of a cross-linked, partly O-(carboxymethylated) cellulose.

Croscarmellose sodium was first used as a stabilizer in horse dietary supplements.

Croscarmellose sodium is an internally cross-linked sodium carboxymethylcellulose for use as a disintegrant in pharmaceutical formulations. The cross-linking reduces water solubility while still allowing the material to swell and absorb many times its weight in water. As a result, it provides superior drug dissolution and disintegration characteristics, thus improving formulas' subsequent bioavailability. Croscarmellose sodium also resolves formulators' concerns over long-term functional stability, reduced effectiveness at high tablet hardness levels, and similar problems associated with other products developed to enhance drug dissolution. Croscarmellose sodium is a very commonly used FDA approved pharmaceutical additive. Its purpose in most tablets - including dietary supplements - is to assist the tablet in disintegrating in the intestinal tract at the required location. If a tablet disintegrating agent is not included, the tablet could disintegrate too slowly, or in the wrong part of the intestine or not at all, thereby reducing the efficacy of the active ingredients.