Thanks to its unique innovative design, Novelia® has been approved as packaging component and delivery system of multidose drug product formulated without preservatives.

“This approval sets an important milestone for Novelia®” said Fanny Sellier, Category Manager of Nemera. “We’re excited to make it easier for UK patients to use preservative-free glaucoma drugs”.

One way of keeping multi-dose eye droppers safe for patients is to add preservatives to the formulation. However, the use of preservatives can cause allergies or ocular irritation, and some can even cause a toxic response, damaging patients’ eyes[*]. Any such reactions are even more an issue for patients who rely on long term use of eye drops for chronic conditions, like glaucoma.

The alternative way to keep eye droppers contamination-free is by the intelligent use of technology. Rather than relying on the anti-microbial properties of preservatives to kill bacterias, the ideal approach is to prevent their entry into the bottle in the first place.

A viable alternative to the use of sterile filters for multi-dose preservative-free eye droppers is a non-return valve system used in conjunction with a silicone membrane to filter the incoming air. Novelia® : a multidose closing tip system avoids the need for preservatives in the drug and prevents bacterial contamination over the duration of treatment.

[*] Report of the International Dry Eye Workshop. Ocul Surf 2007; 5[2]; 65-204.

“There is no limit to Nemera’s ambition to serve patients. We already market devices in over 40 countries for millions of users. We’ll keep investing in new products and in state-of-the-art manufacturing equipment, to help even more patients with high quality devices all over the world.”

Marc Haemel, CEO