# Drug Releasing Microdiscs for Esophageal Drug Delivery

> **NIH NIH R03** · CHILDREN'S MERCY HOSP (KANSAS CITY, MO) · 2020 · $75,000

## Abstract

PROJECT SUMMARY:
 Eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) is an inflammatory disease affecting children at an
increasing rate leading to failure to thrive, esophageal stricturing, and the need for long term
healthcare. Off-label use of topical steroids is the mainstay of treatment, but a high failure rate
and clinical concerns of palatability have necessitated physicians using unstudied grocery items
as excipients. The goal of this proposal is to investigate the properties of current empiric
therapies and use that knowledge to develop a microscale polymer disc (microdiscs) designed
to improve residence time of drug therapy in the esophagus. Microdiscs are designed to prolong
drug residence time in the esophagus and have controlled-release properties to increase
mucosal exposure to drug, thus delivering drug directly to the target site of EoE. The prolonged
residence time of the mucoadhesive discs will be expected to improve bioavailability which
decreases patient exposure to steroids, decreases costs, and opens new possibilities for other
pharmaceutical treatments with fewer side effects to be delivered in the same manner.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9903414
- **Project number:** 5R03HD098604-02
- **Recipient organization:** CHILDREN'S MERCY HOSP (KANSAS CITY, MO)
- **Principal Investigator:** Rachel Chevalier
- **Activity code:** R03 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** $75,000
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2019-04-01 → 2022-03-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9903414

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9903414, Drug Releasing Microdiscs for Esophageal Drug Delivery (5R03HD098604-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-26 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9903414. Licensed CC0.

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