Quality by Design, Objective & benefits of QbD, Elements of QbD, Design tools
- 1. Quality by Design Mr. Vinayak Bodhankar M. Pharm. (QA), PhD*
- 2. Content Introduction Objective & benefits of QbD Elements of QbD Design tools
- 3. Quality by Design is a concept first outlined by Joseph M. Juran in various publications. He supposed that quality could be planned. The concept of QbD was mention in ICH Q8 guidelines, which states that, “To identify quality can not be tested in products, i.e. Quality should be built into product by design.” Quality by Design (QbD) is a strategic approach employed in various industries, including pharmaceuticals, manufacturing, and product development, to ensure the consistent delivery of high-quality products. It involves a systematic and proactive process of integrating quality considerations throughout the entire product lifecycle, from conception to production. Introduction
- 4. Definition of QbD: According to ICH Q8, QbD has been defined as “A systematic approach to development that begins with predefined objectives and emphasizes product and process understanding and process control, based on sound science and quality risk management”. Pharmaceutical Development Quality Risk Management Pharmaceutical Quality System Development & Manufacture of drug substance ICH Q8 ICH Q9 ICH Q10 ICH Q11 QbD + + + =
- 5. Objectives of QbD: To encourages pharmaceutical companies to develop sufficient understanding of their products and manufacture processes. To ensure that their processes are robust. To demonstrate this enhanced understanding to the pharmaceutical regulatory agencies. Benefits of QbD: Better design of product. Fewer problems in manufacturing. Understanding and mitigation of risk. A reduction in overall cost of manufacturing. More efficient technology transfer to manufacturing. Enabling continuous improvement.
- 6. Patient safety and product efficacy are focused. Scientific understanding of pharmaceutical process and methods is done. Critical quality attributes are identified and their effect on final quality of product is analyzed. It offers robust method or process. Method design concept helps to avoid cost involved with post approval changes.
- 8. 1. Define an objective (QTPP) As per ICH guideline Q8 R2 Quality Target Product Profile (QTPP) can be defined as “Summary of the quality characteristics of a drug product that ideally will be achieved to ensure that the desired quality, and thus the safety and efficacy of a drug product is realized”. The Quality target product profile forms the basis for design and the development of the product. QTPP is a product description that summarizes the characteristics expected during the development to respond to the therapeutic drug target.
- 9. Consideration for the Quality Target Product Profile (QTPP): Intended use in a clinical setting, route of administration, dosage form, and delivery systems. Dosage strength, Container closure system Therapeutic moiety release or delivery and attributes affecting pharmacokinetic characteristics (e.g., dissolution) appropriate to the drug product, dosage form being developed. Drug product quality criteria (e.g., sterility, purity, stability, and drug release) appropriate for the intended marketed product
- 10. 2. Determination of Critical Quality Attributes (CQA) According to ICH Q8 R2 “A CQA is a physical, chemical, biological, or, microbiological property or characteristics that should be within an appropriate limit, range to ensure the desired product quality. CQAs are generally linked with the drug substance, excipients intermediates and drug products. It is stated in ICH Q9 that in case of potential drug substance CQA’s are used to guide process development. The quality attributes of a drug product may include identity, assay, content uniformity, degradation products, residual solvents, drug release or dissolution, moisture content, microbial limits, and physical attributes such as color, shape, size, odor, etc. These attributes can be critical or not critical. Criticality of an attribute is primarily based upon the severity of harm to the patient should the product fall outside the acceptable range for that attribute.
- 11. 3. Risk Assessment: Risk assessment consist of the identification of hazards and analysis an evaluation of risk associated with exposure to those hazards. Principle of management are: Scientific knowledge-based evaluation of the risk to quality which eventually link to the protection of the patient. Adequate effort should be taken; formality and documentation of the quality risk management process should be done with the level of risk involve It is joint responsibility of quality unit, business development, engineering, regulatory affairs, production operations, sales and marketing, legal, statistics and clinical department.
- 12. Methods of Risk Assessment Methods of risk assessments are mentioned in ICH guideline Q9 as follows: ¢ Failure mode effects analysis (FMEA) ¢ Failure mode, effects and critically analysis (FMCEA) ¢ Fault tree analysis (FTA) ¢ Hazard analysis and critical control points (HACCP) ¢ Hazard operability analysis (HAZOP) ¢ Preliminary hazard analysis (PHA) ¢ Risk ranking and filtering ¢ Supporting statistical tools.
- 13. 4. Development of Experimental Design Experimental design is the multidimensional combination and interaction of input variables and process parameters that have demonstrated to provide assurance of quality. Pharmaceutical development scientist have just began to making use of computer- aided process design (CAPD) and process simulation to support process development and optimization of manufacturing. Over the years, QbD's focus has been on the process design, understanding, and control, as discussed in the ICH Q8 (R2) guidance. It should be emphasized that product design, understanding, and control are equally important.
- 14. Product design determines whether the product is able to meet patients’ needs, which is confirmed with clinical studies. Product design also determines whether the product is able to maintain its performance through its shelf life, which is confirmed with stability studies. The key objective of product design and understanding is to develop a robust product that can deliver the desired QTPP over the product shelf life Process parameters are referred to as the input operating parameters (e.g., speed and flow rate) or process state variables (e.g., temperature and pressure) of a process step or unit operation. A process parameter is critical when its variability has an impact on a critical quality attribute and therefore should be monitored or controlled to ensure the process produces the desired quality.
- 15. 5. Designing and implementing control strategy Control strategy is required to ensure that material and process is within the expected lower and upper limits. Parameter and material are routinely controlled during production in order to assure reproducibility. Process Capability Index (CpK) Upper limit of specification – Lower limit of specification Standard Deviation =
- 16. 6. Continuous Improvements It is a set of activities that the applicant carries out in order to enhance its ability to meet requirements Continual improvements typically have five phases as follows: 1. Define the problem and the project goals, specifically 2. Measure key aspects of the current process and collect relevant data 3. Analyze the data to investigate and verify cause-and-effect relationships. Determine what the relationships are, and attempt to ensure that all factors have been considered. Seek out root cause of the defect if any. 4. Improve or optimize the current process based upon data analysis using techniques such as design of experiments to create a new, future state process. Set up pilot runs to establish process capability. 5. Control the future state process to ensure that any deviations from target are corrected before they result in defects. Implement control systems such as statistical process control and continuously monitor the process.
- 17. DESIGN TOOLS Prior knowledge Design of Experiments Risk assessment Process analytical technology (PAT) Prior knowledge Prior knowledge can only be obtained through experience, not education. Prior knowledge in the QbD framework generally refers to Knowledge that stems from previous experience that is not in publically available literature. Prior knowledge may be the proprietary information, understanding, or skill that applicants acquire through previous studies.
- 18. Design of Experiments (DoE) DoE is an excellent tool that allows pharmaceutical scientists to systematically manipulate factors according to a prespecified design. The DoE also reveals relationships between input factors and output responses. A series of structured tests are designed in which planned changes are made to the input variables of a process or system. The effects of these changes on a predefined output are then assessed. When DoE is applied to formulation or process development, input variables include the material attributes (e.g., particle size) of raw material or excipients and process parameters (e.g., press speed or spray rate), while outputs are the critical quality attributes of the in-process materials or final drug product (e.g., blend uniformity, particle size or particle size distribution of the granules, tablet assay, content uniformity, or drug release). DoE can helps to identify optimal conditions, CMAs, CPPs, and, ultimately, the design space.
- 19. Process analytical technology (PAT) ICH Q8 (R2) identifies the use of PAT to ensure that the process remains within an established design space. PAT can provide continuous monitoring of CPPs, CMAs, or CQAs to make go/no decisions and to demonstrate that the process is maintained in the design space. In-process testing, CMAs, or CQAs can also be measured online or inline with PAT. Both of these applications of PAT are more effective at detecting failures than end- product testing alone.