e The nail provides a functional protection to the fingertips and surrounding tissue from external injuries. The nail plate consists of three layers including dorsal, intermediate, and ventral layers. The dorsal layer consists of compact, hard keratins, limiting topical drug delivery through the nail. In this study, we investigate the application of fractional CO2 laser that produces arrays of microthermal ablation zones (MAZs to facilitate drug delivery in the nails. We utilized optical coherence tomography (OCT for real-time monitoring of the laser–skin tissue interaction, sparing the patient from an invasive surgical sampling procedure. The time-dependent OCT intensity variance was used to observe drug diffusion through an induced MAZ array. Subsequently, nails were treated with cream and liquid topical drugs to investigate the feasibility and diffusion efficacy of laser-assisted drug delivery. Our results show that fractional CO2 laser improves the effectiveness of topical drug delivery in the nail plate and that OCT could potentially be used for in vivo monitoring of the depth of laser penetration as well as real-time observations of drug delivery.
... 21 Food and Drugs 8 2010-04-01 2010-04-01 false Ear, nose, and throat synthetic polymer material. 874.3620 Section 874.3620 Food and Drugs FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN..., and throat synthetic polymer material. (a) Identification. Ear, nose, and throat synthetic polymer...
Ananda M. Barbosa
Full Text Available In this work, cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs were obtained from flax fibers by an acid hydrolysis assisted by sonochemistry in order to reduce reaction times. The cavitation inducted during hydrolysis resulted in CNC with uniform shapes, and thus further pretreatments into the cellulose are not required. The obtained CNC exhibited a homogeneous morphology and high crystallinity, as well as typical values for surface charge. Additionally, CNC membranes were developed from CNC solution to evaluation as a drug delivery system by the incorporation of a model drug. The drug delivery studies were carried out using chlorhexidine (CHX as a drug and the antimicrobial efficiency of the CNC membrane loaded with CHX was examined against Gram-positive bacteria Staphylococcus aureus (S. Aureus. The release of CHX from the CNC membranes is determined by UV-Vis. The obtaining methodology of the membranes proved to be simple, and these early studies showed a potential use in antibiotic drug delivery systems due to the release kinetics and the satisfactory antimicrobial activity.
Jun H. Lee
Full Text Available Disseminated metastatic breast cancer needs aggressive treatment due to its reduced response to anticancer treatment and hence low survival and quality of life. Although in theory a combination drug therapy has advantages over single-agent therapy, no appreciable survival enhancement is generally reported whereas increased toxicity is frequently seen in combination treatment especially in chemotherapy. Currently used combination treatments in metastatic breast cancer will be discussed with their challenges leading to the introduction of novel combination anticancer drug delivery systems that aim to overcome these challenges. Widely studied drug delivery systems such as liposomes, dendrimers, polymeric nanoparticles, and water-soluble polymers can concurrently carry multiple anticancer drugs in one platform. These carriers can provide improved target specificity achieved by passive and/or active targeting mechanisms.
Agrawal, Mukta; Saraf, Swarnlata; Saraf, Shailendra; Antimisiaris, Sophia G; Chougule, Mahavir Bhupal; Shoyele, Sunday A; Alexander, Amit
According to the Alzheimer Association Report (2017), Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the 6th primary cause of death in the USA, which affects nearly 5.5 million people. In the year 2017 itself, the cost of AD treatment in the USA has been reported to rise to $259 billion. This statistic shows the severity of the disease in the USA which is very much similar across the globe. On the other hand, the tr