Question:

Core tablet coated with cellulose acetate phthalate has been administered to a patient. Where do you expect the drug to be released:

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Cellulose acetate phthalate (CAP) coatings are commonly used for enteric coatings, ensuring drug release in the intestine where the pH is more favorable for the dissolution of the coating.
Updated On: Jul 14, 2026
  • Liver
  • Intestine
  • Oral cavity
  • Stomach
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The Correct Option is B

Approach Solution - 1

Cellulose acetate phthalate (CAP) is a pH-sensitive coating that is designed to dissolve in the intestine, which has a higher pH compared to the stomach. This allows the drug to be released in the intestine, avoiding degradation in the acidic environment of the stomach.

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Approach Solution -2

The question describes a tablet given an enteric coating of cellulose acetate phthalate (CAP) and asks where the drug is released. Understanding what an enteric coating does answers this directly.

  1. Liver: Oral tablets are not designed to release their contents in the liver. Drug reaches the liver only after being absorbed from the gut and carried there by the portal blood, not by direct release from a coated tablet.
  2. Intestine: Cellulose acetate phthalate is a polymer with free carboxylic acid groups that stay unionised (and so insoluble) in the strongly acidic stomach, but ionise and dissolve once the tablet reaches the higher pH environment of the small intestine. This pH-triggered dissolution is the entire purpose of an enteric coat, releasing the drug in the intestine rather than the stomach.
  3. Oral cavity: A tablet coated for enteric release is specifically designed to pass through the mouth intact; it is swallowed whole and is not meant to dissolve there at all.
  4. Stomach: This is precisely what an enteric coat is meant to prevent. CAP is chosen because it resists the acidic pH of the stomach and stays intact until it reaches a less acidic segment further down the gut.

Because CAP is a pH-dependent polymer that dissolves only above the acidic range of the stomach, the coated core passes through the stomach unharmed and breaks down once it reaches the intestine.

Therefore, the correct answer is Intestine.

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