Currently, PTP pharmaceutical use aluminum foil printing equipment is able to satisfy the packaging needs of pharmaceutical products. Due to the wide application of blister packaging, it has become the fastest growing soft packaging material in recent years and the main form of packaging in the fields of food, health products, and pharmaceutical products.
Barrier properties of pharmaceutical packaging aluminum foil
The barrier properties against water vapor and oxygen in the environment are verified through water vapor permeation and oxygen permeation tests to prevent packaging defects of the aluminum foil from causing poor barrier properties, which could lead to problems such as moisture absorption and oxidation of packaged drugs during their shelf life.
Physical and mechanical properties of pharmaceutical use aluminum foil
Heat sealing performance:
Pharmaceutical grade aluminum foil is verified through heat seal strength tests. If the heat sealing strength of blister packaging is poor, the sealing effect of the drug will be reduced, and gas can easily penetrate into the blister from the poor heat seal, which may cause drug deliquescence or oxidation.
Sealability:
The sealability (negative pressure method) test is carried out to identify leakage-prone areas of the finished packaging.
Bonding strength of protective layer:
The bonding strength of the protective layer is verified through adhesive tests to prevent problems such as ink layer rubbing, protective layer contamination onto the adhesive layer, or oxidation of aluminum foil due to protective layer peeling.
Heat resistance of the protective layer:
The heat resistance of the protective layer is verified through heat resistance tests. If the heat resistance of the protective layer is poor, it may peel off during the heat sealing process.
Coating amount of adhesive layer:
The difference in coating amount of the adhesive layer is verified to prevent poor heat sealing due to large variations in the coating amount of adhesive.
Unwinding properties:
Pharmaceutical grade aluminum foil is verified through unwinding performance tests, mainly to test whether the adhesive layer and protective layer will adhere to each other during unwinding. If the adhesive layer and protective layer adhere to each other, it will affect the unwinding speed, production efficiency, and the quality of the aluminum foil regardless of which layer is pulled down.
Sanitary properties of medical aluminum foil
The total volatile content is verified through volatile tests to prevent high levels of volatile content from contaminating the drugs after packaging.
Currently, the surface printing on PTP aluminum foil for blister packaging is very simple, with single color printing being common, and there are almost no counterfeit prevention signs as well as special anti-counterfeiting materials and methods, which provides counterfeiters with convenience for imitation and counterfeiting. According to reports, some manufacturers have nearly 10 anti-counterfeiting signs on the small medicine box, which use anti-counterfeiting signs that can be recognized with the naked eye, such as micro-printing, glossy plate-making, and intaglio printing technology used in banknotes. In addition, on the surface of blister packagings for drugs, PTP pharmaceutical use aluminum foil products with hidden holographic anti-counterfeiting have been used, which have the advantages of strong visual holographic patterns for easy identification by consumers, not affecting the original printing design and product packaging appearance, and not affecting the performance of the PTP aluminum foil material. This anti-counterfeiting product is currently used by many multinational pharmaceutical groups, and the application of hidden fluorescent anti-counterfeiting PTP aluminum foil materials is also one of the future trends in pharmaceutical packaging technology. This anti-counterfeiting effect is relatively hidden and difficult to observe with the naked eye, but the anti-counterfeiting signs or pattern text will be clearly visible under UV light. Some PTP blister packaging manufacturers have already begun using them.