Intelligent intraoral drug delivery microsystem

The authors report on the concept and development of an intelligent intraoral drug delivery microsystem, that provides an alternative approach for the treatment of addiction and chronic diseases. The drug delivery system (DDS) comprises a medication replacement reservoir, a medication release mechanism, a built-in intelligence, a remote control, microsensors, and microactuators. It is thus able to release the medication in a controlled manner according to the patient needs. The emphasis of this article is on the application of sensors and microfluidic components in a real microsystem and also showing some details of two system components, namely, the osmotic pump and the flow sensor. The motivation for the microfluidic approach, the concept of the DDS, the requirements for this specific application, and the arising problems will be presented and discussed. Regarding the sensors and actuators, the problems mainly concern size and power consumption. A major challenging aspect of microfluidic component development is to avoid clogging of small channels because of particles and recrystallization of saturated fluids.