Is it necessary to undertake stability testing for herbal products?
Since last one decade world has seen tremendous growth in herbal drug market, which has resulted in development of numerous proprietary herbal drug formulations by various manufacturers, majority of them comprising of polyherbal formulations. With the advancement of knowledge in the field of phytochemistry it has now been observed that many of these constituents present in the drug may react with each other raising the serious concern about the stability of such formulations. This is the area, which needs to be addressed in order to determine the efficacy of the formulation. Stability testing is carried out in order to guiding formulation development, selecting packaging materials, defining expiration dating, provide evidence on how the quality of active substance or finished product varies with time under the influence of variety of environmental factors.
