Current Pharmaceutical Design - Volume 21, Issue 33, 2015

Polysaccharide rich gums and mucilages are produced by different natural sources such as plants, animals and microbial organisms to fulfil structural and physiological functions. Their diverse structural compositions with a broad range of physicochemical properties make them useful for inclusion in dosage forms for different purposes such as to improve manufacturing processes and/or to facilitate drug delivery. A numbe Read More

There has been increased interest in novel drug delivery systems to be administered via mucosal routes as an alternative to the currently used traditional routes such as parenteral (injections) and oral routes of administration. This is due to the several advantages they offer including avoiding first pass metabolism in the liver for oral administration and local activity which avoids the need for high systemic doses. To ach Read More

Cancer disease is one of the leading causes of morbidity and mortality worldwide, with approximately 14 million new cases and around 8 million cancer-related deaths yearly. Estimates expect to increase these figures over the next few years. Therefore, it is very important to develop more effective and targeted therapies. Polysaccharides are widely used for biomedical and pharmaceutical applications due to their interestin Read More

Polysaccharides belong to a special class of biopolymers that has been used in different areas of research and technology for some years now. They present distinctive features attractive for the biomedical field. Among others, as extracted from natural sources, these materials are usually biocompatible and possess a significant ability to absorb water. Moreover, they can be conveniently modified by chemical means so as t Read More

Obtaining successful ocular formulations able to support an efficient drug concentration at the target tissue for an appropriate period of time is an interesting challenge for modern pharmaceutical technology. In this sense, nanotechnology is one of the available strategies to obtain a drug carrier system that allows access to different compartments of the eye in order to deliver drugs to the desired site. Biodegradable poly Read More

Infectious diseases are an important health concern, as several pathogens have developed the ability to survive inside phagocytic cells (mostly macrophages), encountered at early infection stages, using these cells as trojan horses. In fact, in several cases macrophages have become a nutrient reservoir that helps pathogens to grow in number and spread. It is frequent that conventional therapeutic schedules include lon Read More

The standard eradication treatment of the hostile Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) stomach infection is facing increasing alarming antibiotic resistance worldwide and calls for alternative strategies to the use of antibiotics. One new perspective in this direction is cytoprotective compounds for targeted prevention of the adhesion of the bacteria to the stomach host cell and to inhibit the bacterial cell-cell communication via quor Read More

Arthritics diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis and osteoarthritis are chronic inflammatory and one of the most prevalent health conditions that cause disability (pain and functional limitation of joints). Despite the research advances, the treatment of those pathological conditions remains ineffective, since the pharmacological therapy is palliative, reducing only the symptoms and, in some cases, the chronic progression of t Read More

Alginate represents one of the most appealing biopolymers for pharmaceutical and biomedical applications. Alginate as a biomaterial for clinical use has been established, although not free from issues. Here we provide a critical review on some of the main recent advances in alginate research in drug delivery and its prominent role in cell microencapsulation for the treatment of diseases, such as type 1 diabetes mellitu Read More