Program Overview

Master of Science in Pharmaceutics

The Master of Science in Pharmaceutics is a postgraduate program offered by the College of Pharmacy. The program aims to provide students with a fundamental scientific background in the design and evaluation of modern drug dosages.

Program Overview

The Pharmaceutics Department is responsible for teaching courses in all areas of pharmaceutics, including pharmaceutical microbiology. The department focuses on the study of biopharmaceutics and pharmacokinetics and their impact on the design of pharmaceutical preparations.

Degree Requirements

To graduate, students must:

• Study and pass at least 26 credit hours of master's courses, distributed as follows:
  • Core courses representing 20 credit hours
  • Elective courses representing 6 credit hours
• Successfully complete the master's thesis

Program-Specific Admission Requirements

Admission to the program requires:

1. Meeting the admission requirements listed in paragraph fifteen of the unified regulations governing postgraduate studies in Saudi universities
2. Passing a personal interview in the Pharmaceutics Department

Courses

The program includes the following courses:

Level One: Core Courses

1. 523 CMPH: Analytical Separation Methods (3 credit hours) - Different methods for separating compounds, analytical methods related to separation methods, focus on liquid chromatography and its applications in the analysis of drugs and their pharmaceutical preparations
2. 539 PHC: Advanced Biopharmaceutics (2 credit hours) - General overview of factors affecting drug absorption from the gastrointestinal tract, evaluation of the kinetics and mechanisms of drug absorption and distribution
3. 540 PHC: Drug Delivery Systems (2 credit hours) - Basics of controlled drug delivery systems, oral drug delivery, buccal absorption delivery, nasal delivery systems, eye delivery systems, transdermal delivery systems, vaginal delivery systems, drug implant delivery systems
4. 541 PHC: Advanced Pharmaceutical Chemistry 1 (2 credit hours) - Properties of drugs in different states of matter, phase equilibrium, solubility and distribution phenomena, thermodynamics and chemical equilibrium
5. 545 PHC: Advanced Pharmaceutical Technology (2 credit hours) - Introduction to pharmaceutical processes, equipment and devices used, heat transfer, evaporation, grinding and size reduction of powders, drying, freeze-drying, methods of mixing powders, liquids, and fluids
6. 596 PHC: Research Methods - Research fundamentals, information sources, literature review, intellectual property rights, proposing and formulating research projects, laboratory experiments, data collection and analysis, scientific reports, research articles

Level Two

1. 541 DWI: Pharmacometric Measurements (3 credit hours) - Design of laboratory experiments, statistical tests, analysis of laboratory results
2. 542 PHC: Advanced Pharmaceutical Chemistry 2 (2 credit hours) - Simple and complex reactions, drug stability and degradation mechanism, dissolution theories and rates, ionic equilibrium, membrane diffusion laws
3. 555 PHC: Quality Control and Assurance in Pharmaceutical Industries (2 credit hours) - Controlling the quality of raw materials, final products, packaging materials, good manufacturing practices, standard steps for pharmaceutical processes, documentation

Elective Courses

1. 510 SCL: Advanced Clinical Pharmacokinetics (2 credit hours) - Bioavailability, drug clearance, Michaelis-Menten kinetic model, drug binding to plasma proteins, blood detoxification, membrane adsorption
2. 535 PHC: Drug Targeting (2 credit hours) - Drug targeting terminology, chemical, pharmaceutical, and biological methods, targeting a specific organ or tissue, cell and receptor, formulations for drug targeting
3. 537 PHC: Drug Metabolism (2 credit hours) - Introduction to drug metabolism, pathways, modification, factors affecting drug metabolism, genetic forms, pharmacogenomic, genetic traits and phenotypes
4. 560 PHC: Pharmaceutical Biotechnology (2 credit hours) - Introduction, definition, application, molecular biology of nucleic acids, gene replication, separation, definition, gene bank, cloning, molecular biology of proteins
5. 582 PHC: Pharmaceutical Microbiology 2 (3 credit hours) - Microbial spoilage of preparations, methods of isolation and identification, preserving pharmaceutical preparations, sterilizing, quality control

Study Program

The study program is divided into two semesters:

First Semester

• 531 PHC: Advanced Biopharmaceutics (2 credit hours)
• 541 PHC: Advanced Pharmaceutical Chemistry 1 (2 credit hours)
• 545 PHC: Advanced Pharmaceutical Technology (2 credit hours)
• 591 PHC: Discussion Session 1 (1 credit hour)
• 592 PHC: Research Methods (1 credit hour)
• 533 PHC: Drug Delivery Systems (2 credit hours)

Second Semester

• 542 PHC: Advanced Pharmaceutical Chemistry 2 (2 credit hours)
• 541 DWI: Pharmacometric Measurements (3 credit hours)
• 555 PHC: Quality Control and Assurance in Pharmaceutical Industries (2 credit hours)
• Elective courses selected by the department (6 credit hours)

Descriptions of New Courses

Detailed descriptions of each course are provided to give students a comprehensive understanding of the program's curriculum.

Thesis

Students are required to complete a master's thesis as part of the program's requirements. The thesis is an original research project that demonstrates the student's ability to conduct independent research in the field of pharmaceutics.