Benzyl Alcohol/[email protected]

Antibacterial Agent

Benzyl alcohol is used as a bacteriostatic preservative at low concentration in intravenous medications, cosmetics and topical drugs.BA is the antiseptic which keeps the steroid solution sterile.Benzyl Alcohol (BA):A fairly potent solvent, whose main function for our purposes is keeping a solution bacteriostatic. It's presence as low as 0.9% is enough to prevent practically all microbial growth in solution.

Benzyl Alcohol is often the primary solvent and sometime the only solvent in a steroid given formula. Its primary function is as a sterilizing agent. However, due to its solvency power it is often used to keep hormones in solution with oil or other vehicles. It is also one of the thinnest (that is best for viscosity reduction).

Its use in Steroids is to preserve the suspension for months, even years, without any reduction in sterility. Alcohol is an antibacterial disinfectant and is used as such in many industries. As aforementioned Benzyl Alcohol ensures the Steroid maintains its sterility when used in the right concentration.

Increase Solubility

Benzyl Alcohol (BA) is used to increase the lipid solubility of esterfied compounds and to prevent bacteria growth in the oil.
The shorter the ester, the more BA is needed to get the compound to dissolve.More BA is required to dissolve the raw powder to make high concentration products

Side Effect

However, if too much is used the Steroid will be painful to inject and will cause post injection soreness.The major drawback to this solvent is that it tends to make for painful injections if the concentration goes above 10%. (This is true for any low molecular weight alcohol). Less than this tends to be painless for most people.

Unfortunately, it can also cause the destruction of cells and significant localised pain and inflammation. The discomfort is characterised by fairly rapid onset of a painful, red, swollen area.