Customised polypills may be produced in the pharmacy from two or more drug packages using an assembly machine. Each drug package may comprise an array of cells containing individual doses of a single drug. The individual doses may be combined within the cells of the packages to produce an end user package with an array of cells containing the combined drugs in the form of individual polypills, which may be formed as capsules or pastilles. Label indicia of the drug packages may be combined together to form a composite label of the end user package. Serialization data may be read from the packages during assembly and sent to a remote server for authentication and supply chain management. In another aspect, patients who have a history of poor compliance with a prescribed oral antipsychotic while periodically seeking symptomatic relief from another prescribed psychoactive, are provided with both medicaments in the form of polypills to be taken in place of the solo antipsychotic when the patient is in crisis. Providing the preferred psychoactive as a combination motivates the patient to resume their antipsychotic therapy when symptoms return, which may result in better compliance and more effective management of psychosis in the community.

A filling machine for filling capsules with at least one product includes operating stations for operating on the capsules, and a moving system for transferring the capsules through the operating stations that include first and second dosing stations that are configured to fill the capsules with respective products. The moving system includes a linear electric motor, a guide rail, which includes a stator of the motor, and transfer carriages associated with the guide rail and provided with respective seats to house bodies and caps of the capsules. The transfer carriages have respective rotors of the motor interacting independently with respective magnetic fields generated by the stator to move the respective transfer carriages along the guide rail with an intermittent motion at the first dosing station when the first dosing station is activated and/or with a continuous motion at the second dosing station when the second dosing station is activate.

The disclosure relates to a transfer device of a capsule filling machine for transferring at least one capsule from a capsule receptacle of a capsule segment to a downstream process station, and to a capsule filling machine having such a transfer device. The transfer device includes a transport segment having at least one transport receptacle, which extends along a vertical longitudinal axis, wherein the transport receptacle is configured as a clamping receptacle having a clamping element, acting radially with respect to the longitudinal axis of the transport receptacle, for the capsule.

A weighing system is mounted on a support, and the support is configured to support the weighing system. The weighing system includes a feeding mechanism, a conveying and transferring mechanism, pushing rods, a pushing mechanism, resetting mechanisms, a weighing mechanism, and a linkage follower mechanism. The feeding mechanism is arranged at a top portion of the support. The conveying and transferring mechanism is arranged below the feeding mechanism. The conveying and transferring mechanism includes a transferring wheel, a plurality of first channels, a plurality of sliding blocks, a plurality of first grooves and a guide base. The pushing mechanism is arranged on one side of the transferring wheel. The resetting mechanisms are configured to push the sliding blocks connected with the pushing rods to slide along the first channel towards an initial direction, and the weighing mechanism is arranged below the transferring wheel.

A compartmented hard shell capsule for containing active formulations, and methods and apparatuses for forming, filling and encapsulating the compartmented hard shell capsules. The compartmented hard shell capsule includes a cap portion and a body portion. The cap portion has a hollow cavity defining a cap chamber. The body portion can be removably inserted into the cap portion. The body portion has an open end, a closed end and a sidewall defining a hollow cavity and a serrated edge along the open end. The serrated edge may be folded over to form a barrier to enclose the body portion, thereby creating a body chamber that is separate from the cap chamber when the body portion is inserted into the cap portion. The methods for filling and encapsulating the compartmented hard shell capsules can be completed in one continuous process, which increases cost-effectiveness for use of the compartmented hard shell capsules.

Various methods and apparatuses are presented for an ingestible capsule that includes a digital, ingestible sensor component—or ingestible sensor—embedded into the capsule. The ingestible sensor component may be configured to activate upon coming into contact with conductive fluid, such as a body's stomach fluid. Once activated, the ingestible sensor component may be configured to perform various tasks, such as transmitting one or more signals and obtaining biometric data about the body that ingested the capsule.

There is described apparatus for filling a material into a receptacle, said apparatus comprising: (i) a material; (ii) a receptacle handling unit comprising a pair of axially aligned bushes for collecting a receptacle; and (iii) a bush pair handling system comprising: (a) a means for separating the receptacle into a receptacle body and a receptacle closure; (b) means for temporarily attaching and detaching the one or both of the bushes from the bush pair handling system; (c) means for transporting the receptacle body to the filling station and aligning the receptacle body with a filler nozzle at the filling station; (d) means for transporting the filled receptacle body from the filling station to a closure unit for refitting the receptacle closure; and e) means for segregating compliant receptacles from non-compliant receptacles.

A plunger is described, which is configured for application in a syringe-type pump for a machine for encapsulation of soft capsules, for adjusting the quantity of filler to be injected into said soft capsules, said plunger having an axially developing structure and comprising: a tip (31) and a sealing body (32) connected to the tip, adapted to penetrate into said syringe-type pump (P), a first mechanical abutment ring (33), fixedly positioned, connected to said sealing body, a plunger stopper housing (34), connected to said fixedly positioned mechanical abutment ring, a second mechanical abutment ring (35), axially adjustable, a mechanical dowel (37) protruding from said stopper housing, an adjuster nut (36) adapted to be screwed on said mechanical dowel (37) for adjusting the axial position of the second ring (35) relative to the first ring, so as to adjust the axial position of the plunger in said syringe-type pump (P).

The disclosure relates to a capsule filling machine for filling two-part capsules each having an upper capsule portion and a lower capsule portion. The capsule filling machine includes a main drive unit for operating the capsule filling machine and at least one capsule segment for conveying the capsules. The capsule segment includes a lower segment portion for receiving the lower capsule portion and an upper segment portion for receiving the upper capsule portion. The lower segment portion and the upper segment portion are constructed to be able to be moved relative to each other. The capsule segment is operatively connected to the main drive unit in such a manner that the relative movement of the lower segment portion and upper segment portion with respect to each other is effected by the main drive unit.

A capsule filling machine for filling capsules and a cleaning unit for use in a capsule filling machine are disclosed. The capsule filling machine includes at least two processing paths with a plurality of processing stations. One of the processing stations includes a cleaning unit. The cleaning unit has, for each of the at least two processing paths, a leadthrough path with a longitudinal axis for leading through capsules. At least one cleaning element for cleaning the capsules is arranged on each leadthrough path.