STABILITY STUDY

OF
BIOLOGICALS
Stability of vaccines: key definitions

Stability is the ability of a vaccine to retain

its chemical, physical, microbiological and
biological properties within specified limits
throughout its shelf-life.
 Real-time/ real condition stability studies:
physico-chemical, biological & other
vaccine characteristics during & up to the
expected shelf-life and storage periods
under expected handling and storage
conditions
 What is a Stable Vaccine?

 A vaccine with a very long shelf life

A vaccine lot that complies with release
specifications throughout shelf
life
 Technical specifications
Vaccine that complies with the principles
of the initial license through out life cycle
Technical, non-clinical and clinical
specifications
Factors Having a Strong Impact on
Stability of Vaccines
 Purity
 Formulation
 Stabilizers
Human Serum Albumin (HAS), recombinant human Albumin
(rHA), Gelatine, Sugars, Sorbitol
Thiomersal
AlOH, AlPO
Ions (Buffer systems)
 Pharmaceutical form
Lyophylized versus liquid
 Storage
Frozen versus refrigerator
 Guidelines on Stability of Vaccines

 ICH HARMONISED TRIPARTITE GUIDELINE QUALITY OF

BIOTECHNOLOGICAL PRODUCTS:
 STABILITY TESTING OF BIOTECHNOLOGICAL/BIOLOGICAL
PRODUCTS, Q5C, dated 30 November 1995
 Development of a CPMP Points to Consider on Stability and
Traceability Requirements for Vaccine Intermediates, dated
2000
 WHO guideline on stability evaluation of vaccines, dated
2006
 Other regional guidance
All these guidance documents provide rather general
instructions.
Product specific cases must be considered case by case.
 Product Specific Issues

 To what extend may critical quality attributes

change during shelf life without affecting safety
and efficacy?
 Are all potential changes detectable by
technical means?
 How many stability lots are needed to address
the impact on stability due to variances inherent to the
manufacturing process
 Wide specifications
 Number and age of intermediates
 How can these uncertainties best be investigated during
clinical development and post-marketing monitoring
 Stability evaluation: guiding
principles
 Vital part of quality and safety assessment of a
vaccine
 Temperature sensitivity
 Specific biological activity: potency assay
 Design of stability studies - depends of the
objectives of
 stability studies:
 1) Determine shelf-life, storage conditions and to
support licensing
 2) monitor vaccine stability in the post-licensure
period
 3) Support manufacturing changes: comparability
 Defining acceptance criteria for
 stability parameters by clinical trials
 The vaccine life cycle
 Registration/launch is the critical
time:
studies prior to that point are aimed
at obtaining information to support
registration.
 Subsequent studies are aimed at
assuring that the assessments at the
time of registration are still correct
 Using stability data and specifications
to set shelf life

• Goal: Throughout its shelf life, product must

be comparable to batches shown to be safe
and effective in clinical studies
 Stability data are used to make predictions

that can be extrapolated to future batches of

product
 The most accurate predictions are based on
mathematical modeling of biologically
relevant stability-indicating parameters
 Potency Definition

Specific ability or capacity of the product,

as indicated by appropriate laboratory
tests or by adequately controlled clinical
data obtained through the administration
of the product in the manner intended, to
effect a given result
 Why do we do a potency assay?

 • In development, to:
Assure that safe potencies are not exceeded in clinical trials
Obtain information that will support licensure-including
correlation of potency with clinical response
• After licensure, to assure that lots behave similarly to
those tested in the clinical trials that supported
licensure
 The potency should not be below the lowest potency

believed to be efficacious
The potency should not exceed the highest potency
believed to be safe
• The potency assay thus provides a “bridge” between
licensed material and the clinical trials
What does a potency assay tell us?

• The assay estimates the mean potency value for a lot

• There are two sources of variability in the measured

potency of an individual vial from the same vaccine
lot– manufacturing variability and assay uncertainty

• Thus, we can never know the actual potency in an

individual vial that was used in a clinical trial

• We can know the characteristics of the lot of vaccine

from which that vial came (we routinely estimate the
mean potency)
 Variability in potency assay results

• The standard error of the mean potency of a lot provides

information about the accuracy with which we can estimate the
mean potency, and thus provides information about both of
these sources of variability, combined
• The SEM provides information about our level of certainty that
we know the mean potency of the lot; just as the mean potency
does not provide information about individual vials (which is
impossible to obtain, when assays are variable), the SEM
provides information about that estimate
• The standard deviation of the mean potency provides
information about the distribution of potency test values, but
does not tell us about the underlying actual values
• Conformance to GMP and assuring consistency of manufacture
provides assurance that the manufacturing variability remains
constant over time
 Clinically relevant parameters
• L.L.: the lowest dose at which we are
comfortable, based on the clinical
data, that the vaccine is going
to be effective. This is normally a
specification.
•U.L.: The highest dose at which we
are comfortable, based on the clinical
data, that the vaccine is going to be
safe. This is normally a specification.
 Dose
 Stability profile
 Analytical assay variability
 Confidence limits
 Two models
• Compliance model
– Substantially all potency measurements should exceed
some predefined quantity
• Often, the mean potency from clinical trials is used to set this
minimum specification

• This is very difficult (perhaps impossible) to reliably implements in

original clinical tests were performed based on an
understanding of mean potency, not on an understanding of “all
potency measurements”
• Estimation model

– The mean potency of substantially all vaccine lots should

be at a level that is not less than the mean potency of
vaccine lots shown to be effective in clinical trials
 Compliance model

 Shelf life is set arbitrarily

depending on the luck associated with
each individual assay at each time point,
and based on the starting potencies of lots
on test
 Release potency must be high enough to
prevent test results that fall below L.L.
due to assay variability, from requiring an
unacceptably short shelf life, or from
subsequently failing stability monitoring
studies
 Estimation method
 Statistical methods (when
appropriate, a regression line)
also can be used to estimate
lower bounds on the mean
potency estimate at end-expiry
for any given release potency,
thus allowing estimation of shelf
life
 Development-what do we need to
know about stability?
• What are the kinetics of decay?
• What are the degradation products?
• Are there stability-influencing factors that should also be
controlled?
• Do we have sufficient knowledge of the stability of intermediates?
• Are the assays adequate?
– Are potency assays stability-indicating?
– Are potency assays precise enough to support product
development?
• Do we have a sufficient understanding of material tested in clinical
trials?
• Do we have a sufficient understanding of product performance at
potency ranges likely to be encountered post-licensure?
 TYPES OF STABILITY
 Real Time Stability: Long term
stability under recommended storage
conditions for the shelf life proposed
for the product.
 Accelerated Testing: Studies under
exaggerated storage conditions.
 Stress studies: More severe
conditions than those used for
accelerated studies.
 TEMPERATURES
 Real Time: Storage Temperature of
the product e.g. 2-8°C for Tetanus
Vaccine
 Accelerated: 15±2°C higher than
the maximum temperature of
storage at real time storage of the
product e.g. 25 ± 2°C
 Stress: +10°C ± 2°C than the
accelerated temperature e.g.35 ±
2°C
 SAMPLE
 DRUG SUBSTANCES:
INTERMEDIATE PRODUCT: ACTIVE
RAW MATERIAL
FORMULATED BULK: FINAL BULK

 DRUG PRODUCT:
FINISHED PRODUCT: FINAL LOT
S.No. Criteria No. of batch Type of study
1 Introduction of new 3 Long term and accelerated
product

2. Change in method of 3 Long term and accelerated

production

3. Change in formulation 3 Long term and accelerated

4. Change in container 3 Long term and accelerated

5. Change in manufacturing 1 Long term and accelerated

equipment

6. Change in location 3 Long term and accelerated

 DESIGN
Bracketing: Extremes of certain design
factors e.g.
Strength: 10 ug, 25ug, 100 ug
Package size: 1 dose, 5 dose ,10 dose
Matrixing: A selected subset of the the
total number of the possible samples for all
factors is tested at specified time and at a
subsequent time another subset of samples
for all factors is tested.
 Stability indicating parameters
 Choice of parameters to be tested: depends of
the
 product characteristics
 Link between vaccine quality and efficacy or
safety as
 demonstrated in clinical trials – ideal case
 Potency, antigen content,appearance, pH,
 completeness of adsorption, adjuvant content;
physicochemical
 properties etc
 New vaccines: parameters to be identified during
the product development
 Real Time 2-8°C for 4 years
(for 3 years expiry)
0,3M,6M,9M,12M,18M,24M,36M & 48
M
Accelerated Temperature 20-25°C
for 6 months
0,1M,2M,3M & 6 Months
Stress Study: 35°C for 1-2 months
0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7& 8 weeks
 ACCEPTANCE CRITERIA
 In general, significant change is
defined as:
 5% change in assay from the initial
value or failure to meet the
acceptance criteria by biological or
immunological parameters or as
applicable for the specification of the
product.
 Any degradation product (impurity)
exceeding its acceptance criteria
 ACCEPTANCE CRITERIA
 Failure to meet the acceptance
criteria for physical and chemical
parameters
 Failure to meet the acceptance
criteria for dissolution for stipulated
dosages.
 Cumulative age of an antigen in the
final Product
 Reported as a major issue in practice
 Final product should be stable during the whole
period of shelf-life irrespective of the age of its
intermediate products
 Data should be collected on an ongoing basis –
usually not available before approval of storage
periods and shelf-life
 Accelerated stability studies - to demonstrate
that an aged intermediate did not affect stability
of the final product
 Thermal stability testing – lot
release
 An indicator of consistency of production
 Not designed to provide a predictive value
of real time
 TS is a shelf-life specification in current
WHO vaccine
 specific recommendations
 Live attenuated vaccines – OPV, MMR, YF
 For other vaccines: consider relevance of
the rate of
 change for safety and efficacy
 Stability of combined vaccines

 Determination of the shelf-life should be

based on the shortest shelf-life component
 Data obtained for monovalent vaccines
should support stability of combined
vaccine
 Stability of combined vaccines should not
be based on the extrapolation of the
stability data of the individual components
alone
 Labelling

 Recommended
:
–
storage conditions and
expiry date
 – Sensitivity of vaccines to environmental
factors (eg light,freezing) and preventive
measures
 If VVMs are to be used, adequate stability
data should be generated to support
selection of appropriate VVM for the
vaccine in question