Editing Tablet (pharmacy) (section)

==Types==

===Pills===
[[Image:Pilule contraceptive.jpg|thumb|right|[[Combined oral contraceptive pill]]s were nicknamed "the pill" in the 1960s{{citation needed|date=February 2016}}]]
A pill was originally defined as a small, round, solid pharmaceutical [[oral administration|oral]] [[dosage form]] of medication. [[wikt:pill#Etymology|The word's etymology]] reflects the historical concepts of grinding the ingredients with a [[mortar and pestle]] and rolling the resultant paste or dough into lumps to be dried. Today, in its strict sense, the word ''pill'' still refers specifically to tablets (including caplets) rather than [[capsule (pharmacy)|capsules]] (which were invented much later), but because a simple [[hyponymy and hypernymy|hypernym]] is needed to intuitively cover all such oral dosage forms, the broad sense of the word ''pill'' is also widely used and includes both tablets and capsules — colloquially, any solid oral form of medication falls into the "pill" category (see ''[[wikt:pill#Usage notes|pill § Usage notes]]'').

An early example of a pill comes from ancient Rome. They were made of zinc carbonates, [[hydrozincite]] and [[smithsonite]]. The pills were used for sore eyes and were found aboard a Roman ship that wrecked in 140 BC. However, these tablets were meant to be pressed on the eyes, not swallowed.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23049-worlds-oldest-pills-treated-sore-eyes.html|title=World's oldest pills treated sore eyes|work=New Scientist|date=7 January 2013|access-date=5 February 2013|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130122102750/http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23049-worlds-oldest-pills-treated-sore-eyes.html|archive-date=22 January 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|title=Ingredients of a 2,000-y-old medicine revealed by chemical, mineralogical, and botanical investigations|journal=PNAS|date=7 January 2013|doi=10.1073/pnas.1216776110|pmid=23297212|volume=110|issue=4|pages=1193–1196|pmc=3557061|last1=Giachi|first1=G.|last2=Pallecchi|first2=P.|last3=Romualdi|first3=A.|last4=Ribechini|first4=E.|last5=Lucejko|first5=J. J.|last6=Colombini|first6=M. P.|last7=Mariotti Lippi|first7=M.|bibcode=2013PNAS..110.1193G|doi-access=free}}</ref>

; Defects/imperfections arising during tablet manufacturing
* Formulation related: sticking, picking, binding
* Processing: capping, lamination, cracking, chipping
* Machine: double impression

===Caplets===
[[Image:Four colors of pills.jpg|thumb|Variations on a common tablet design, which can be distinguished by both colour and shape]]

A caplet is a smooth, coated, oval-shaped medicinal tablet in the general shape of a [[capsule (pharmacy)|capsule]]. Many caplets have an indentation running down the middle, so they may be split in half more easily.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.drugs.com/article/pill-splitting.html |title=Pill Splitting - A Safe Way to Save Healthcare Dollars? |last=Anderson |first=Leigh |publisher=[[Drugs.com]] |date=2014-02-24 |access-date=2016-04-29 |quote=Many pills that can be safely split have a "score", a line down the middle of the pill, that allows for easier splitting. |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160501013112/http://www.drugs.com/article/pill-splitting.html |archive-date=2016-05-01 }}</ref> Consumers have viewed capsules as the most effective way to take medication ever since they first appeared. For this reason, producers of drugs such as [[Over-the-counter drugs|OTC]] analgesics wanting to emphasize the strength of their product developed the "caplet", a [[portmanteau]]<ref>{{cite magazine | last=Safire | first=William | date=1986-03-09 | title=On Language; The Caplet Solution | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/03/09/magazine/on-language-the-caplet-solution.html | magazine=The New York Times | access-date=2017-12-06 | url-status=live | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171213143526/http://www.nytimes.com/1986/03/09/magazine/on-language-the-caplet-solution.html | archive-date=2017-12-13 }}</ref> of ''capsule-shaped tablet'',<ref>{{cite journal | title=Comparison of Two Forms of Loperamide–Simeticone and a Probiotic Yeast (Saccharomyces boulardii) in the Treatment of Acute Diarrhoea in Adults: A Randomised Non-Inferiority Clinical Trial | journal=Drugs in R&D | volume=15 | issue=4 | pages=363–373 | doi=10.1007/s40268-015-0111-y | pmid=26541878 | url= | pmc=4662947 | year=2015 | last1=Cottrell | first1=J. | last2=Koenig | first2=K. | last3=Perfekt | first3=R. | last4=Hofmann | first4=R. | author5=For the Loperamide–Simethicone Acute Diarrhoea Study Team }}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url=https://ncit.nci.nih.gov/ncitbrowser/ConceptReport.jsp?dictionary=NCI_Thcesaurus&code=C69002&ns=NCI_Thesaurus | title=Compressed Sugar Coated Caplet Dosage Form (Code C69002) | publisher=NCI Thesaurus | access-date=2017-12-06 }}</ref> in order to tie this positive association to more efficiently produced tablet pills as well as being an easier-to-swallow shape than the usual disk-shaped tablet.

===Orally disintegrating tablets (ODT)===
[[File:Zyprexa.jpg|thumb|[[Olanzapine]] tablets]]

An [[orally disintegrating tablet]] or orodispersible tablet (ODT), is a drug [[dosage form]] available for a limited range of over-the-counter (OTC) and [[Prescription drug|prescription]] medications.