RECENT ADVANCES IN QUALITY CONTROL METHODS OF AYURVEDIC FORMULATIONS

Quality control is an integral part of medicine to ensure the quality of medicament. Various multi-disciplinary and bio-analytical approaches such as development of Standard Operative Procedure, preliminary Phytochemical evaluation, physicochemical evaluation, chromatographic evaluation, safety and efficacy evaluation have been employed for the standardization of various Ayurvedic formulations. One of the important factors hindering the globalization of Ayurvedic drugs and therapies is the lack of standardization. To achieve the reproducibility, efficacy and safety of the product standardized protocol of quality control is very essential. In ayurvedic system identification of the genuine raw drugs is done on the basis of their morphology and rasa panchaka. In addition the recent advancements like DNA finger printing, identification of biomarker compound also add for authentication and discrimination of genuine raw drugs. Various protocols containing the parameters to assess various dosage forms help in standardization of the formulations. An overview covering various techniques employed in extraction and characterization of herbal medicines as well as Nano medicines standardization is also reported. Advancements of instruments help to reduce the manpower and the advancements of quality control techniques assist to identify the adulteration and compound present in the formulation. This paper aims to highlight the recent advancement methods adopted for standardization.